The Day the Bells Went Quiet (Pius IX)

Senigallia's boy, in the spring of ninety-two, Grew up to wear the ring in eighteen forty-six, June the sixteenth, fifty-four years old, They called me "the liberal hope" for all of Rome. In eighteen fifty-four I raised my voice, Declared Mary conceived without a stain, Then called the bishops to a council hall, Sixty-nine, the First Vatican, to stand and explain. Oh, the bells of Rome are ringing, but the world is turning, Banners in the streets and a new flag burning, Italy is rising, one nation, one name, And I'm holding on to a crown that won't remain! Oh, the bells of Rome are ringing, but the sound is changing, Kingdoms are falling and the map's rearranging, I was a prince, I was a shepherd, I was both, Now the tide's coming in, and it will not slow! The young men dreamed of a country united, From the Alps to the sea, a single tongue, And the Papal States stood right in the middle, Like a stone in a river that could not be moved. I fled once in disguise, then I came back, With French soldiers guarding my gate, But armies can leave, and the world's turning fast, And the future had set us a date. Oh, the bells of Rome are ringing, but the world is turning, Cannons in the distance, and the city is burning, Italy is rising, one nation, one name, And I'm holding on to a crown that won't remain! Oh, the bells of Rome are ringing, but the sound is changing, Kingdoms are falling and the map's rearranging, I was a prince, I was a shepherd, I was both, Now the tide's coming in, and it will not slow! September twentieth, eighteen seventy, Troops at the Porta Pia, the breach in the wall, The soldiers marched into the Eternal City, And a thousand years of rule began to fall. I closed the gates of the Vatican behind me, Called myself the "prisoner" of those walls, Not a king of land, but a keeper of faith, Is that what a pope is, after all? Eight more winters in the quiet halls, No kingdom, no army, no map to command, February seventh, eighteen seventy-eight, Eighty-five years, after a brief illness, I ended. The land was lost, but the Church endured, And the faithful still came from far and near, For power is dust, but a prayer is a seed, And the seed was still growing here. Oh, the bells of Rome are ringing, but the world is turning, Cannons in the distance, and the city is burning, Italy is rising, one nation, one name, And I'm holding on to a crown that won't remain! Oh, the bells of Rome are ringing, but the sound is changing, Kingdoms are falling and the map's rearranging, I was a prince, I was a shepherd, I was both, Now the tide's coming in, and it will not slow! Ring, bells of Rome, ring one more time... Not for the crown, but for the faith... Not for the crown, but for the faith...