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I sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all
oppression and shame,
I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men at anguish with
themselves, remorseful after deeds done,
I see in low life the mother misused by her children, dying,
neglected, gaunt, desperate,
I see the wife misused by her husband, I see the treacherous seducer
of young women,
I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love attempted to be
hid, I see these sights on the earth,
I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny, I see martyrs and
prisoners,
I observe a famine at sea, I observe the sailors casting lots who
shall be kill'd to preserve the lives of the rest,
I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon
laborers, the poor, and upon negroes, and the like;
All these--all the meanness and agony without end I sitting look out upon,
See, hear, and am silent.
TO RICH GIVERS
What you give me I cheerfully accept,
A little sustenance, a hut and garden, a little money, as I
rendezvous with my poems,
A traveler's lodging and breakfast as journey through the States,--
why should I be ashamed to own such gifts? why to advertise for them?
For I myself am not one who bestows nothing upon man and woman,
For I bestow upon any man or woman the entrance to all the gifts of
the universe.
THE DALLIANCE OF THE EAGLES
Skirting the river road, (my forenoon walk, my rest,)
Skyward in air a sudden muffled sound, the dalliance of the eagles,
The rushing amorous contact high in space together,
The clinching interlocking claws, a living, fierce, gyrating wheel,
Four beating wings, two beaks, a swirling mass tight grappling,
In tumbling turning clustering loops, straight downward falling,
Till o'er the river pois'd, the twain yet one, a moment's lull,
A motionless still balance in the air, then parting, talons loosing,
Upward again on slow-firm pinions slanting, their separate diverse flight,
She hers, he his, pursuing.
ROAMING IN THOUGHT [After reading Hegel]
Roaming in thought over the Universe, I saw the little that is Good
steadily hastening towards immortality,
And the vast all that is call'd Evil I saw hastening to merge itself
and become lost and dead.
A FARM PICTURE
Through the ample open door of the peaceful country barn,
A sunlit pasture field with cattle and horses feeding,
And haze and vista, and the far horizon fading away.
A CHILD'S AMAZE
Silent and amazed even when a little boy,
I remember I heard the preacher every Sunday put God in his statements,
As contending against some being or influence.
THE RUNNER
On a flat road runs the well-train'd runner,
He is lean and sinewy with muscular legs,
He is thinly clothed, he leans forward as he runs,
With lightly closed fists and arms partially rais'd.
BEAUTIFUL WOMEN
Women sit or move to and fro, some old, some young,
The young are beautiful--but the old are more beautiful than the young.
MOTHER AND BABE
I see the sleeping babe nestling the breast of its mother,
The sleeping mother and babe--hush'd, I study them long and long.
THOUGHT
Of obedience, faith, adhesiveness;
As I stand aloof and look there is to me something profoundly
affecting in large masses of men following the lead of those who
do not believe in men.
VISOR'D
A mask, a perpetual natural disguiser of herself,
Concealing her face, concealing her form,
Changes and transformations every hour, every moment,
Falling upon her even when she sleeps.
THOUGHT
Of justice--as If could be any thing but the same ample law,
expounded by natural judges and saviors,
As if it might be this thing or that thing, according to decisions.
GLIDING O'ER ALL
Gliding o'er all, through all,
Through Nature, Time, and Space,
As a ship on the waters advancing,
The voyage of the soul--not life alone,
Death, many deaths I'll sing.
HAST NEVER COME TO THEE AN HOUR
Hast never come to thee an hour,
A sudden gleam divine, precipitating, bursting all these bubbles,
fashions, wealth?
These eager business aims--books, politics, art, amours,
To utter nothingness?
THOUGHT
Of Equality--as if it harm'd me, giving others the same chances and
rights as myself--as if it were not indispensable to my own
rights that others possess the same.
TO OLD AGE
I see in you the estuary that enlarges and spreads itself grandly as
it pours in the great sea.
LOCATIONS AND TIMES
Locations and times--what is it in me that meets them all, whenever
and wherever, and makes me at home?
Forms, colors, densities, odors--what is it in me that corresponds
with them?
OFFERINGS
A thousand perfect men and women appear,
Around each gathers a cluster of friends, and gay children and
youths, with offerings.
TO THE STATES [To Identify the 16th, 17th, or 18th Presidentiad]
Why reclining, interrogating? why myself and all drowsing?
What deepening twilight-scum floating atop of the waters,
Who are they as bats and night-dogs askant in the capitol?
What a filthy Presidentiad! (O South, your torrid suns! O North,
your arctic freezings!)
Are those really Congressmen? are those the great Judges? is that
the President?
Then I will sleep awhile yet, for I see that these States sleep, for
reasons;
(With gathering murk, with muttering thunder and lambent shoots we
all duly awake,
South, North, East, West, inland and seaboard, we will surely awake.)
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