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Leaves of Grass (1871-72)
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THIS COMPOST.
1
1 SOMETHING startles me where I thought I was safest; |
I withdraw from the still woods I loved; |
I will not go now on the pastures to walk; |
I will not strip the clothes from my body to meet my
lover the sea;
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I will not touch my flesh to the earth, as to other flesh,
to renew me.
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2 O how can it be that the ground does not sicken? |
How can you be alive, you growths of spring? |
How can you furnish health, you blood of herbs, roots,
orchards, grain?
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Are they not continually putting distemper'd corpses
within you?
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Is not every continent work'd over and over with sour
dead?
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3 Where have you disposed of their carcasses? |
Those drunkards and gluttons of so many generations; |
Where have you drawn off all the foul liquid and meat; |
I do not see any of it upon you to-day—or perhaps I am
deceiv'd;
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I will run a furrow with my plough—I will press my
spade through the sod, and turn it up under-
neath;
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I am sure I shall expose some of the foul meat. |
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2
4 Behold this compost! behold it well! |
Perhaps every mite has once form'd part of a sick per-
son—Yet behold!
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The grass of spring covers the prairies, |
The bean bursts noiselessly through the mould in the
garden,
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The delicate spear of the onion pierces upward, |
The apple-buds cluster together on the apple-branches, |
The resurrection of the wheat appears with pale visage
out of its graves,
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The tinge awakes over the willow-tree and the mul
berry-tree,
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The he-birds carol mornings and evenings, while the
birds sit on their nests,
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The young of poultry break through the hatch'd eggs, |
The new-born of animals appear—the calf is dropt from
the cow, the colt from the mare,
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Out of its little hill faithfully rise the potato's dark
green leaves,
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Out of its hill rises the yellow maize-stalk—the lilacs
bloom in the door-yards;
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The summer growth is innocent and disdainful above
all those strata of sour dead.
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That the winds are really not infectious, |
That this is no cheat, this transparent green-wash of
the sea, which is so amorous after me,
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That it is safe to allow it to lick my naked body all over
with its tongues,
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That it will not endanger me with the fevers that have
deposited themselves in it,
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That all is clean forever and forever, |
That the cool drink from the well tastes so good, |
That blackberries are so flavorous and juicy, |
That the fruits of the apple-orchard, and of the orange-
orchard—that melons, grapes, peaches, plums,
will none of them poison me,
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That when I recline on the grass I do not catch any
disease,
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Though probably every spear of grass rises out of what
was once a catching disease.
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6 Now I am terrified at the Earth! it is that calm and
patient,
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It grows such sweet things out of such corruptions, |
It turns harmless and stainless on its axis, with such
endless successions of diseas'd corpses,
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It distils such exquisite winds out of such infused fetor, |
It renews with such unwitting looks, its prodigal, an-
nual, sumptuous crops,
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It gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such
leavings from them at last.
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