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FROM pent-up aching rivers, From that of myself without which I were nothing, From what I am determin'd

And if the body were not the soul, what is the soul?

and visit him to see, he was wise also, He was six feet tall, he was over eighty years old, his sons were

from head to foot, It attracts with fierce undeniable attraction, I am drawn by its breath as if I were

only one man, this the father of those who shall be fathers in their turns, In him the start of populous

A WOMAN waits for me, she contains all, nothing is lacking, Yet all were lacking if sex were lacking,

or if the moisture of the right man were lacking.

original loins, perfectly sweet, I, chanter of Adamic songs, Through the new garden the West, the great cities

We Two, How Long We Were Fool'd. WE TWO, HOW LONG WE WERE FOOL'D.

WE two, how long we were fool'd, Now transmuted, we swiftly escape as Nature escapes, We are Nature,

ONCE I PASS'D THROUGH A POPULOUS CITY.

ONCE I pass'd through a populous city imprinting my brain for future use with its shows, architecture

What does it mean to American persons, progresses, cities?

A NEWER garden of creation, no primal solitude, Dense, joyous, modern, populous millions, cities and

city of spires and masts! City nested in bays! my city! ALL IS TRUTH.

Once I Pass'd Through a Populous City. ONCE I PASS'D THROUGH A POPULOUS CITY.

ONCE I pass'd through a populous city imprinting my brain for future use with its shows, architecture

, customs, traditions, Yet now of all that city I remember only a woman I casually met there who detain'd

me for love of me, Day by day and night by night we were together—all else has long been forgotten by

America, and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies, I will make inseparable cities

attraction of friend to friend, Of the well-married husband and wife, of children and parents, Of city

for city and land for land.

the sick, sick dread lest the one he lov'd might secretly be indifferent to him, Whose happiest days were

capitol, still it was not a happy night for me that follow'd, And else when I carous'd, or when my plans were

slow drops, Candid from me falling, drip, bleeding drops, From wounds made to free you whence you were

City of Orgies. CITY OF ORGIES.

CITY of orgies, walks and joys, City whom that I have lived and sung in your midst will one day make

the crossing of the street or on the ship's deck give a kiss in return, We observe that salute of American

All is recall'd as we flit by each other, fluid, affectionate, chaste, matured, You grew up with me, were

Only I will establish in the Mannahatta and in every city of these States inland and seaboard, And in

Through youth and through middle and old age, how unfaltering, how affectionate and faithful they were

, menials, priests alarming, air breathing, water drinking, on the turf or the sea-beach dancing, Cities

and Oregon; Sojourning east a while longer, soon I travel toward you, to remain, to teach robust American

I DREAM'D in a dream I saw a city invincible to the attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth, I

dream'd that was the new city of Friends, Nothing was greater there than the quality of robust love,

it led the rest, It was seen every hour in the actions of the men of that city, And in all their looks

Or the vaunted glory and growth of the great city spread around me?

invisible, Now it is you, compact, visible, realizing my poems, seeking me, Fancying how happy you were

if I could be with you and become your comrade; Be it as if I were with you.

what persons and cities are here? Who are the infants, some playing, some slumbering?

I see the cities of the earth and make myself at random a part of them, I am a real Parisian, I am a

Christiania or Stockholm, or in Siberian Irkutsk, or in some street in Iceland, I descend upon all those cities

What cities the light or warmth penetrates I penetrate those cities myself, All islands to which birds

You flagg'd walks of the cities! you strong curbs at the edges! You ferries!

I think heroic deeds were all conceiv'd in the open air, and all free poems also, I think I could stop

Whoever accepts me he or she shall be blessed and shall bless me. 6 Now if a thousand perfect men were

many distant countries, habituès of far-distant dwellings, Trusters of men and women, observers of cities

couple, and the fruits of orchards and flowers of gardens, To take to your use out of the compact cities

Look'd toward the lower bay to notice the vessels arriving, Saw their approach, saw aboard those that were

and yellow light over the tops of houses, and down into the clefts of streets. 4 These and all else were

to me the same as they are to you, I loved well those cities, loved well the stately and rapid river

, The men and women I saw were all near to me, Others the same—others who look back on me because I look'd

also, The best I had done seem'd to me blank and suspicious, My great thoughts as I supposed them, were

SONG OF THE ANSWERER. 1 NOW list to my morning's romanza, I tell the signs of the Answerer, To the cities

, The best farms, others toiling and planting and he unavoidably reaps, The noblest and costliest cities

range and diversity—always the continent of Democracy; Always the prairies, pastures, forests, vast cities

floes, White drift spooning ahead where the ship in the tempest dashes, On solid land what is done in cities

fiddle, others sit on the gunwale smoking and talking; Late in the afternoon the mocking-bird, the American

rude carts, cotton bales piled on banks and wharves; Encircling all, vast-darting up and wide, the American

and down, casting swift shadows in specks on the opposite wall where the shine is; The athletic American

greatest city in the whole world. 5 The place where a great city stands is not the place of stretch'd

Where the city stands with the brawniest breed of orators and bards, Where the city stands that is belov'd

city of the healthiest fathers stands, Where the city of the best-bodied mothers stands, There the great

city stands. 6 How beggarly appear arguments before a defiant deed!

How the floridness of the materials of cities shrivels before a man's or woman's look!

Ships, farms, shops, barns, factories, mines, City and State, North, South, item and aggregate, We dedicate

cities and States in thee! Our freedom all in thee! our very lives in thee!

hospitable, (thou only art hospitable as God is hospitable.) 4 When late I sang sad was my voice, Sad were

And the tidy and fresh-cheek'd girls, and the barefoot negro boy and girl, And all the changes of city

The City Dead-House. THE CITY DEAD-HOUSE.

BY the city dead-house by the gate, As idly sauntering wending my way from the clangor, I curious pause

ages that men and women like us grew up and travel'd their course and pass'd on, What vast-built cities

and phrenology, What of liberty and slavery among them, what they thought of death and the soul, Who were

O I know that those men and women were not for nothing, any more than we are for nothing, I know that

Do their lives, cities, arts, rest only with us? Did they achieve nothing for good for themselves?

In one, among the city streets a laborer's home appear'd, After his day's work done, cleanly, sweet-air'd

suite of noble rooms, 'Mid plenteous books and journals, paintings on the walls, fine statuettes, Were

All, all the shows of laboring life, City and country, women's, men's and children's, Their wants provided

swiftly hasten all—none refuse, all attend, Armies, ships, antiquities, libraries, paintings, machines, cities

WHERE the city's ceaseless crowd moves on the livelong day, Withdrawn I join a group of children watching

his or her body under- stands understands by subtle analogies all other theories, The theory of a city

meanings unknown before, Subtler than ever, more harmony, as if born here, related here, Not to the city's

A NEWER garden of creation, no primal solitude, Dense, joyous, modern, populous millions, cities and

the wounded groaning in agony, The hiss and crackle of flames, the blacken'd ruins, the embers of cities

Lo soul, the retrospect brought forward, The old, most populous, wealthiest of earth's lands, The streams

from east to west as they lie unclothed, The Asiatic and African are hand in hand, the European and American

stands; Let judges and criminals be transposed—let the prison-keepers be put in prison—let those that were

To think that the sun rose in the east—that men and women were flexible, real, alive—that every thing

To think the thought of death merged in the thought of materials, To think of all these wonders of city

To think how much pleasure there is, Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in business?

7 It is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and father, it is to identify you, It is

The threads that were spun are gather'd, the weft crosses the warp, the pattern is systematic.

touching, including God, including Saviour and Satan, Ethereal, pervading all, (for without me what were

what were God?)

burial-places to find him, And I found that every place was a burial-place; The houses full of life were

streets, the shipping, the places of amusement, the Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, the Mannahatta, were

now I am willing to disregard burial-places and dispense with them, And if the memorials of the dead were

FIRST O songs for a prelude, Lightly strike on the stretch'd tympanum pride and joy in my city, How she

costumes of peace with indifferent hand, How your soft opera-music changed, and the drum and fife were

Forty years had I in my city seen soldiers parading, Forty years as a pageant, till unawares the lady

of this teeming and turbulent city, Sleepless amid her ships, her houses, her incalculable wealth, With

The blood of the city up—arm'd! arm'd!

sonorous voice ringing across the continent, Your masculine voice O year, as rising amid the great cities

Over the traffic of cities—over the rumble of wheels in the streets; Are beds prepared for sleepers at

the sea-bird, and look down as from a height, I do not deny the precious results of peace, I see populous

cities with wealth incalculable, I see numberless farms, I see the farmers working in their fields or

spacious and haughty States, (nor any five, nor ten,) Nor market nor depot we, nor money-bank in the city