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Me, ruthless and devilish as any, that my wrists are not chain'd with iron, or my ankles with iron?

the air I breathed froze me; A thick gloom fell through the sunshine and darken'd me; Must I change my

indifferent , but trembling with age and your unheal'd wounds, you mounted the scaffold;) I would sing in my

know not why, but I loved you…(and so go forth little song, Far over sea speed like an arrow, carrying my

love, and drop these lines at his feet;) —Nor forget I to sing of the wonder, the ship as she swam up my

bay, Well-shaped and stately the Great Eastern swam up my bay, she was 600 feet long, Her moving swiftly

Loud I call to you, my love!

who I am, my love.

Hither, my love! Here I am! Here!

But my love no more, no more with me!

O what is my destination?

greater heroes and bards, They refuse to awake at the touch of any man but me: It is I, you women—I make my

babes I beget upon you are to beget babes in their turn, I shall demand perfect men and women out of my

WITH antecedents; With my fathers and mothers, and the accumulations of past ages; With all which, had

In the name of These States, and in your and my name, the Past, And in the name of These States, and

in your and my name, the Present time.

Who is he that would become my follower? Who would sign himself a candidate for my affections?

doned abandoned ; Therefore release me now, before troubling yourself any further—Let go your hand from my

it, Nor do those know me best who admire me, and vauntingly praise me, Nor will the candidates for my

love, (unless at most a very few,) prove victorious, Nor will my poems do good only—they will do just

O harsh surrounding cloud that will not free my soul!

And what shall my perfume be, for the grave of him I love?

O wild and loose to my soul! O wondrous singer!

While my sight that was bound in my eyes unclosed, As to long panoramas of visions. 18 I saw the vision

Must I pass from my song for thee; From my gaze on thee in the west, fronting the west, com- muning communing

And so will some one, when I am dead and gone, write my life?

(As if any man really knew aught of my life; As if you, O cunning Soul, did not keep your secret well

WHEN I heard at the close of the day how my name had been receiv'd with plaudits in the capitol, still

it was not a happy night for me that fol- low follow'd ; And else, when I carous'd, or when my plans

ing undressing , bathed, laughing with the cool waters, and saw the sun rise, And when I thought how my

all that day my food nourish'd me more—and the beautiful day pass'd well, And the next came with equal

joy—and with the next, at evening, came my friend; And that night, while all was still, I heard the

What Think You I Take My Pen in Hand? WHAT THINK YOU I TAKE MY PEN IN HAND?

WHAT think you I take my pen in hand to record?

Weave In, Weave In, My Hardy Life WEAVE IN, WEAVE IN, MY HARDY LIFE. WEAVE in!

weave in, my hardy life!

to my bare-stript heart, And reach'd till you felt my beard, and reach'd till you held my feet.

My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach; With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds, and volumes

My ties and ballasts leave me—I travel—I sail—my elbows rest in the sea-gaps; I skirt the sierras—my

We closed with him—the yards entangled—the cannon touch'd; My captain lash'd fast with his own hands.

Now I laugh content, for I hear the voice of my little captain,(says my grandmother's father;) We have

VIGIL strange I kept on the field one night, When you, my son and my comrade, dropt at my side that day

battle, the even-contested battle; Till late in the night reliev'd, to the place at last again I made my

long-drawn sigh—Long, long I gazed; Then on the earth partially reclining, sat by your side, leaning my

chin in my hands; Passing sweet hours, immortal and mystic hours with you, dearest comrade—Not a tear

, not a word; Vigil of silence, love and death—vigil for you, my son and my soldier, As onward silently

WHILE my wife at my side lies slumbering, and the wars are over long, And my head on the pillow rests

at home, and the mys- tic mystic midnight passes, And through the stillness, through the dark, I hear

, just hear, the breath of my infant, There in the room, as I wake from sleep, this vision presses upon

with eager calls, and orders of officers; While from some distant part of the field the wind wafts to my

or near, (rousing, even in dreams, a devilish exultation, and all the old mad joy, in the depths of my

that was not the end of those nations, or any person of them, any more than this shall be the end of my

my blue veins leaving! O drops of me!

, from me falling—drip, bleeding drops, From wounds made to free you whence you were prison'd, From my

face—from my forehead and lips, From my breast—from within where I was conceal'd —press forth, red drops—confession

ON my northwest coast in the midst of the night, a fishermen's group stands watching; Out on the lake

To Workingmen TO WORKINGMEN. 1 COME closer to me; Push close, my lovers, and take the best I possess;

Neither a servant nor a master am I; I take no sooner a large price than a small price—I will have my

become so for your sake; If you remember your foolish and outlaw'd deeds, do you think I cannot remember my

are; I am this day just as much in love with them as you; Then I am in love with you, and with all my

List close, my scholars dear!

Air, soil, water, fire—these are words; I myself am a word with them—my qualities inter- penetrate interpenetrate

with theirs—my name is nothing to them; Though it were told in the three thousand languages, what would

air, soil, water, fire, know of my name?

When I undertake to tell the best, I find I cannot, My tongue is ineffectual on its pivots, My breath

trod, calling, I sing, for the last; (Not cities, nor man alone, nor war, nor the dead, But forth from my

vistas beyond— to the south and the north; To the leaven'd soil of the general western world, to attest my

Northern ice and rain, that began me, nourish me to the end; But the hot sun of the South is to ripen my

daughters, sons, preluding, The love, the life of their bodies, meaning and being, Curious, here behold my

cycles, in their wide sweep, having brought me again, Amorous, mature—all beautiful to me—all wondrous; My

wondrous; Existing, I peer and penetrate still, Content with the present—content with the past, By my

cheerfully accept, A little sustenance, a hut and garden, a little money— these, as I rendezvous with my

for something to repre- sent represent the new race, our self-poised Democracy, Therefore I send you my

Softly I lay my right hand upon you—you just feel it, I do not argue—I bend my head close, and half-

MY spirit to yours, dear brother; Do not mind because many, sounding your name, do not understand you

I do not sound your name, but I understand you, (there are others also;) I specify you with joy, O my

divisions, jealousies, recriminations on every side, They close peremptorily upon us, to surround us, my

or a girl with me, I ate with you, and slept with you—your body has become not yours only, nor left my

body mine only, You give me the pleasure of your eyes, face, flesh, as we pass—you take of my beard,

my brother or my sister! Keep on!

I exclude you; Not till the waters refuse to glisten for you, and the leaves to rustle for you, do my

My girl, I appoint with you an appointment—and I charge you that you make preparation to be worthy to

if that were not the resumé; Of Histories—As if such, however complete, were not less complete than my

poems; As if the shreds, the records of nations, could possibly be as lasting as my poems; As if here

AS I sit with others, at a great feast, suddenly, while the music is playing, To my mind, (whence it

it harm'd me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself—As if it were not indispensable to my

sake, Of departing—of the growth of a mightier race than any yet, Of myself, soon, perhaps, closing up my

; And it seems to me if I could know those men, I should become attached to them, as I do to men in my

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; I will not touch my flesh to the earth, as to other flesh, to renew me

I do not see any of it upon you to-day—or perhaps I am deceiv'd; I will run a furrow with my plough—I

will press my spade through the sod, and turn it up under- neath underneath ; I am sure I shall expose

transparent green-wash of the sea, which is so amorous after me, That it is safe to allow it to lick my

and then in the silence, Alone I had thought—yet soon a silent troop gathers around me, Some walk by my

side, and some behind, and some embrace my arms or neck, They, the spirits of friends, dead or alive—thicker

lilac, with a branch of pine, Here out of my pocket, some moss which I pull'd off a live-oak in Florida

from the water by the pond-side, that I reserve, I will give of it—but only to them that love, as I my

That Shadow, My Likeness THAT SHADOW, MY LIKENESS.

THAT shadow, my likeness, that goes to and fro, seek- ing seeking a livelihood, chattering, chaffering

it where it flits; How often I question and doubt whether that is really me; But in these, and among my

lovers, and carolling my songs, O I never doubt whether that is really me.

; Or rude in my home in Dakotah's woods, my diet meat, my drink from the spring; Or withdrawn to muse

place, with my own day, here.

My comrade!

my intrepid nations! O I at any rate include you all with perfect love!

steamers steaming through my poems!

ME SPONTANEOUS me, Nature, The loving day, the mounting sun, the friend I am happy with, The arm of my

friend hanging idly over my shoulder, The hill-side whiten'd with blossoms of the mountain ash, The

press'd and glued together with love, Earth of chaste love—life that is only life after love, The body of my

and trembling encircling fingers—the young man all color'd, red, ashamed, angry; The souse upon me of my

greed that eats me day and night with hungry gnaw, till I saturate what shall produce boys to fill my

Ere, departing, fade from my eyes your forests of bayonets; Spirit of gloomiest fears and doubts, (yet

steps keep time: —Spirit of hours I knew, all hectic red one day, but pale as death next day; Touch my

mouth, ere you depart—press my lips close!

Let them scorch and blister out of my chants, when you are gone; Let them identify you to the future

You objects that call from diffusion my meanings and give them shape!

Why, when they leave me, do my pennants of joy sink flat and lank?

My call is the call of battle—I nourish active re- bellion rebellion ?

It is safe—I have tried it—my own feet have tried it well. Allons! Be not detain'd!

I give you my hand!

untrodden and mouldy—I see no longer any axe upon it; I see the mighty and friendly emblem of the power of my

I do not vaunt my love for you; I have what I have. The axe leaps!

O my father, It is so broad, it covers the whole sky! FATHER.

now the halyards have rais'd it, Side of my banner broad and blue—side of my starry banner, Discarding

eastern shore, and my western shore the same; And all between those shores, and my ever running Mississippi

, with bends and chutes; And my Illinois fields, and my Kansas fields, and my fields of Missouri; The

My limbs, my veins dilate; The blood of the world has fill'd me full—my theme is clear at last : —Banner

Inflating my throat—you, divine average! You, Earth and Life, till the last ray gleams, I sing.

Open mouth of my Soul, uttering gladness, Eyes of my Soul, seeing perfection, Natural life of me, faithfully

To prepare for sleep, for bed—to look on my rose- color'd rose-color'd flesh, To be conscious of my body

How my thoughts play subtly at the spectacles around! How the clouds pass silently overhead!

win- dows windows , my eyes, As I went forth in the morning—As I beheld the light breaking in the east

no unreturn'd love—the pay is certain, one way or another; (I loved a certain person ardently, and my

—at last I accept your terms; Bringing to practical, vulgar tests, of all my ideal dreams, And of me,

I remember I said, before my leaves sprang at all, I would raise my voice jocund and strong, with re-

con- tribute contribute to them, When breeds of the most perfect mothers denote America, Then to me my

I have press'd through in my own right, I have offer'd my style to every one—I have journey'd with confident

step, While my pleasure is yet at the full, I whisper, So long!

Remember my words—I love you—I depart from materials, I am as one disembodied, triumphant, dead.

Sleep-Chasings SLEEP-CHASINGS. 1 I WANDER all night in my vision, Stepping with light feet, swiftly and

Receive me and my lover too—he will not let me go without him.

my clothes were stolen while I was abed, Now I am thrust forth, where shall I run?

carefully darn my grandson's stockings.

How he informs against my brother and sister, and takes pay for their blood!

A SIGHT in camp in the day-break grey and dim, As from my tent I emerge so early, sleepless, As slow

Who are you, my dear comrade? Then to the second I step—And who are you, my child and darling?

for your dear sake, O soldiers, And for you, O soul of man, and you, love of comrades; The words of my