Leaves of Grass (1856)
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| A YOUNG man came to me with a message
from his brother, |
| How should the young man know the whether and
when of his brother? |
| Tell him to send me the signs. |
| And I stood before the young man face to face,
and took his right hand in my left hand, and his left hand in my right hand, |
| And I answered for his brother, and for men, and
I answered for the poet, and sent these signs. |
| Him all wait for, him all yield up to, his word is
decisive and final, |
| Him they accept, in him lave, in him perceive
themselves, as amid light, |
| Him they immerse, and he immerses them. |
| Beautiful women, the haughtiest nations, laws, the
landscape, people, animals, |
| The profound earth and its attributes, and the un-
quiet ocean, |
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| All enjoyments and properties, and money, and
whatever money will buy, |
| The best farms, others toiling and planting, and
he unavoidably reaps, |
| The noblest and costliest cities, others grading
and building, and he domiciles there, |
| Nothing for any one, but what is for him—near
and far are for him, |
| The ships in the offing, the perpetual shows and
marches on land, are for him, if they are for any body. |
| He puts things in their attitudes, |
| He puts today out of himself, with plasticity and
love, |
| He places his own city, times, reminiscences,
parents, brothers and sisters, associations, employment, politics, so that the rest never shame them afterward, nor assume to com- mand them. |
| He is the answerer, |
| What can be answered he answers, and what
cannot be answered, he shows how it cannot be answered. |
| A man is a summons and challenge; |
| It is vain to skulk—Do you hear that mocking
and laughter? Do you hear the ironical echoes? |
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| Books, friendships, philosophers, priests, action,
pleasure, pride, beat up and down, seeking to give satisfaction, |
| He indicates the satisfaction, and indicates them
that beat up and down also. |
| Whichever the sex, whatever the season or place,
he may go freshly and gently and safely, by day or by night, |
| He has the pass-key of hearts—to him the
response of the prying of hands on the knobs. |
| His welcome is universal—the flow of beauty is
not more welcome or universal than he is, |
| The person he favors by day or sleeps with at
night is blessed. |
| Every existence has its idiom, every thing has an
idiom and tongue, |
| He resolves all tongues into his own, and bestows
it upon men, and any man translates, and any man translates himself also, |
| One part does not counteract another part—he is
the joiner, he sees how they join. |
| He says indifferently and alike, How are you,
friend? to the President at his levee, |
| And he says, Good-day, my brother! to Cudge that
hoes in the sugar-field, |
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| And both understand him, and know that his
speech is right. |
| He walks with perfect ease in the capitol, |
| He walks among the Congress, and one represen-
tative says to another, Here is our equal appearing and new. |
| Then the mechanics take him for a mechanic, |
| And the soldiers suppose him to be a captain, and
the sailors that he has followed the sea, |
| And the authors take him for an author, and the
artists for an artist, |
| And the laborers perceive he could labor with
them and love them. |
| No matter what the work is, that he is the one to
follow it, or has followed it, |
| No matter what the nation, that he might find his
brothers and sisters there. |
| The English believe he comes of their English
stock, |
| A Jew to the Jew he seems—a Russ to the Russ
—usual and near, removed from none. |
| Whoever he looks at in the traveler's coffee-
house claims him, |
| The Italian or Frenchman is sure, and the
German is sure, and the Spaniard is sure, and the island Cuban is sure. |
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| The engineer, the deck-hand on the great lakes,
or on the Mississippi, or St. Lawrence, or Sacramento, or Hudson, or Delaware, claims him. |
| The gentleman of perfect blood acknowledges his
perfect blood, |
| The insulter, the prostitute, the angry person, the
beggar, see themselves in the ways of him — he strangely transmutes them, |
| They are not vile any more—they hardly know
themselves, they are so grown. |
| Do you think it would be good to be the writer
of melodious verses? |
| Well, it would be good to be the writer of
melodious verses; |
| But what are verses beyond the flowing char-
acter you could have? or beyond beautiful manners and behaviour? |
| Or beyond one manly or affectionate deed of an
apprentice-boy? or old woman? or man that has been in prison, or is likely to be in prison? |