She stands in the smoky morning air, her copper lamp held elegantly aloft across the waters from Manhattan. Oh, say can you see America’s most instantly recognizable monument — and, perhaps more to the immediate point, for how much longer?

The Statue of Liberty has been in front of the world now for nearly 134 years, the rousingly famous sonnet engraved on the bronze plaque on her pedestal for almost the same length of time.