|
Leaves of Grass (1891-92)
contents
| previous
| next
THE DEAD TENOR.
| With Spanish hat and plumes, and gait inimitable, |
Back from the fading lessons of the past, I'd call, I'd tell and
own,
|
How much from thee! the revelation of the singing voice from
thee!
|
| (So firm—so liquid-soft—again that tremulous, manly timbre! |
The perfect singing voice—deepest of all to me the lesson—trial
and test of all:)
|
How through those strains distill'd—how the rapt ears, the soul
of me, absorbing
|
Fernando's heart, Manrico's passionate call, Ernani's, sweet
Gennaro's,
|
| I fold thenceforth, or seek to fold, within my chants transmuting, |
| Freedom's and Love's and Faith's unloos'd cantabile, |
| (As perfume's, color's, sunlight's correlation:) |
| From these, for these, with these, a hurried line, dead tenor, |
A wafted autumn leaf, dropt in the closing grave, the shovel'd
earth,
|
contents
| previous
| next
|
| |