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Cluster: Thoughts. (1867)

Table of Contents (1867)

Poems in this cluster


THOUGHTS.

1.

OF these years I sing, How they pass through convuls'd pains, as through  
 parturitions;
How America illustrates birth, gigantic youth, the  
 promise, the sure fulfilment, despite of people  
 —Illustrates evil as well as good;
How many hold despairingly yet to the models de- 
 parted, caste, myths, obedience, compulsion, and  
 to infidelity;
How few see the arrived models, the Athletes, The  
 States—or see freedom or spirituality—or hold  
 any faith in results,
(But I see the Athletes—and I see the results glorious  
 and inevitable—and they again leading to other  
 results;)
How the great cities appear—How the Democratic  
 masses, turbulent, wilful, as I love them,
How the whirl, the contest, the wrestle of evil with  
 good, the sounding and resounding, keep on  
 and on;
How society waits unform'd, and is between things  
 ended and things begun;
How America is the continent of glories, and of the  
 triumph of freedom, and of the Democracies,  
 and of the fruits of society, and of all that is  
 begun;
And how The States are complete in themselves—  
 And how all triumphs and glories are complete  
 in themselves, to lead onward,
And how these of mine, and of The States, will in  
 their turn be convuls'd, and serve other par- 
 turitions and transitions,
And how all people, sights, combinations, the Demo- 
 cratic masses, too, serve—and how every fact  
 serves,
  [ begin page 26c ]ppp.00473.460.jpg And how now, or at any time, each serves the exquisite  
 transition of Death.

2.

OF seeds dropping into the ground—of birth, Of the steady concentration of America, inland, up- 
 ward, to impregnable and swarming places,
Of what Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio and the rest, are  
 to be,
Of what a few years will show there in Nebraska,  
 Colorado, Nevada, and the rest;
Of what the feuillage of America is the preparation  
 for—and of what all the sights, North, South,  
 East and West, are;
Of the temporary use of materials, for identity's  
 sake,
Of departing—of the growth of a mightier race than  
 any yet,
Of myself, soon, perhaps, closing up my songs by  
 these shores,
Of California—of Oregon—and of me journeying to  
 live and sing there;
Of the Western Sea—of the spread inland between it  
 and the spinal river,
Of the great pastoral area, athletic and feminine, Of all sloping down there where the fresh free giver,  
 the mother, the Mississippi flows,
Of future men and women there—of happiness in  
 those high plateaus, ranging three thousand  
 miles, warm and cold;
Of cities yet unsurvey'd and unsuspected, (as I am  
 also, and as it must be;)
Of the new and good names—of the strong develop- 
 ments—of inalienable homesteads;
Of a free and original life there—of simple diet and  
 clean and sweet blood;
Of litheness, majestic faces, clear eyes, and perfect  
 physique there;
  [ begin page 27c ]ppp.00473.461.jpg Of immense spiritual results, future years, each side  
 of the Anahuacs;
Of these leaves, well understood there, (being made  
 for that area;)
Of the native scorn of grossness and gain there; (O it lurks in me night and day—What is gain, after  
 all, to savageness and freedom?)

Table of Contents (1867)

Poems in this cluster


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