10

Allons! the inducements shall be greater;    125   
We will sail pathless and wild seas;       
We will go where winds blow, waves dash, and the Yankee clipper speeds by under full sail.       
     
Allons! with power, liberty, the earth, the elements!       
Health, defiance, gayety, self-esteem, curiosity;       
Allons! from all formules!    130   
From your formules, O bat-eyed and materialistic priests!       
     
The stale cadaver blocks up the passage—the burial waits no longer.       
     
Allons! yet take warning!       
He traveling with me needs the best blood, thews, endurance;       
None may come to the trial, till he or she bring courage and health.    135   
     
Come not here if you have already spent the best of yourself;       
Only those may come, who come in sweet and determin’d bodies;       
No diseas’d person—no rum-drinker or venereal taint is permitted here.       
     
I and mine do not convince by arguments, similes, rhymes;       
We convince by our presence.    140   
     
11

Listen! I will be honest with you;       
I do not offer the old smooth prizes, but offer rough new prizes;       
These are the days that must happen to you:       
     
You shall not heap up what is call’d riches,       
You shall scatter with lavish hand all that you earn or achieve,    145   
You but arrive at the city to which you were destin’d—you hardly settle yourself to satisfaction, before you are call’d by an irresistible call to depart,       
You shall be treated to the ironical smiles and mockings of those who remain behind you;       
What beckonings of love you receive, you shall only answer with passionate kisses of parting,       
You shall not allow the hold of those who spread their reach’d hands toward you.       
     
12

Allons! after the GREAT COMPANIONS! and to belong to them!    150   
They too are on the road! they are the swift and majestic men; they are the greatest women.       
Over that which hinder’d them—over that which retarded—passing impediments large or small,       
Committers of crimes, committers of many beautiful virtues,       
Enjoyers of calms of seas, and storms of seas,       
Sailors of many a ship, walkers of many a mile of land,    155   
Habitués of many distant countries, habitués of far-distant dwellings,       
Trusters of men and women, observers of cities, solitary toilers,       
Pausers and contemplators of tufts, blossoms, shells of the shore,       
Dancers at wedding-dances, kissers of brides, tender helpers of children, bearers of children,       
Soldiers of revolts, standers by gaping graves, lowerers down of coffins,    160   
Journeyers over consecutive seasons, over the years—the curious years, each emerging from that which preceded it,       
Journeyers as with companions, namely, their own diverse phases,       
Forth-steppers from the latent unrealized baby-days,       
Journeyers gayly with their own youth—Journeyers with their bearded and well-grain’d manhood,       
Journeyers with their womanhood, ample, unsurpass’d, content,    165   
Journeyers with their own sublime old age of manhood or womanhood,       
Old age, calm, expanded, broad with the haughty breadth of the universe,       
Old age, flowing free with the delicious near-by freedom of death.       
     
13

Allons! to that which is endless, as it was beginningless,       
To undergo much, tramps of days, rests of nights,    170   
To merge all in the travel they tend to, and the days and nights they tend to,       
Again to merge them in the start of superior journeys;       
To see nothing anywhere but what you may reach it and pass it,       
To conceive no time, however distant, but what you may reach it and pass it,       
To look up or down no road but it stretches and waits for you—however long, but it stretches and waits for you;    175   
To see no being, not God’s or any, but you also go thither,       
To see no possession but you may possess it—enjoying all without labor or purchase—abstracting the feast, yet not abstracting one particle of it;       
To take the best of the farmer’s farm and the rich man’s elegant villa, and the chaste blessings of the well-married couple, and the fruits of orchards and flowers of gardens,       
To take to your use out of the compact cities as you pass through,       
To carry buildings and streets with you afterward wherever you go,    180   
To gather the minds of men out of their brains as you encounter them—to gather the love out of their hearts,       
To take your lovers on the road with you, for all that you leave them behind you,       
To know the universe itself as a road—as many roads—as roads for traveling souls.       
     
14

The Soul travels;       
The body does not travel as much as the soul;    185   
The body has just as great a work as the soul, and parts away at last for the journeys of the soul.       
     
All parts away for the progress of souls;       
All religion, all solid things, arts, governments,—all that was or is apparent upon this globe or any globe, falls into niches and corners before the procession of Souls along the grand roads of the universe.       
     
Of the progress of the souls of men and women along the grand roads of the universe, all other progress is the needed emblem and sustenance.       
     
Forever alive, forever forward,    190   
Stately, solemn, sad, withdrawn, baffled, mad, turbulent, feeble, dissatisfied,       
Desperate, proud, fond, sick, accepted by men, rejected by men,       
They go! they go! I know that they go, but I know not where they go;       
But I know that they go toward the best—toward something great.       
     
15

Allons! whoever you are! come forth!    195   
You must not stay sleeping and dallying there in the house, though you built it, or though it has been built for you.       
     
Allons! out of the dark confinement!       
It is useless to protest—I know all, and expose it.       
     
Behold, through you as bad as the rest,       
Through the laughter, dancing, dining, supping, of people,    200   
Inside of dresses and ornaments, inside of those wash’d and trimm’d faces,       
Behold a secret silent loathing and despair.       
     
No husband, no wife, no friend, trusted to hear the confession;       
Another self, a duplicate of every one, skulking and hiding it goes,       
Formless and wordless through the streets of the cities, polite and bland in the parlors,    205   
In the cars of rail-roads, in steamboats, in the public assembly,       
Home to the houses of men and women, at the table, in the bed-room, everywhere,       
Smartly attired, countenance smiling, form upright, death under the breast-bones, hell under the skull-bones,       
Under the broadcloth and gloves, under the ribbons and artificial flowers,       
Keeping fair with the customs, speaking not a syllable of itself,    210   
Speaking of anything else, but never of itself.       
     
16

Allons! through struggles and wars!       
The goal that was named cannot be countermanded.       
     
Have the past struggles succeeded?       
What has succeeded? yourself? your nation? nature?    215   
Now understand me well—It is provided in the essence of things, that from any fruition of success, no matter what, shall come forth something to make a greater struggle necessary.       
     
My call is the call of battle—I nourish active rebellion;       
He going with me must go well arm’d;       
He going with me goes often with spare diet, poverty, angry enemies, desertions.       
     
17

Allons! the road is before us!    220   
It is safe—I have tried it—my own feet have tried it well.       
     
Allons! be not detain’d!       
Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten, and the book on the shelf unopen’d!       
Let the tools remain in the workshop! let the money remain unearn’d!       
Let the school stand! mind not the cry of the teacher!    225   
Let the preacher preach in his pulpit! let the lawyer plead in the court, and the judge expound the law.       
     
Mon enfant! I give you my hand!       
I give you my love, more precious than money,       
I give you myself, before preaching or law;       
Will you give me yourself? will you come travel with me?    230   
Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?

83. I Sit and Look Out



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;            5   
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.

84. Me Imperturbe



ME imperturbe, standing at ease in Nature,       
Master of all, or mistress of all—aplomb in the midst of irrational things,       
Imbued as they—passive, receptive, silent as they,       
Finding my occupation, poverty, notoriety, foibles, crimes, less important than I thought;       
Me private, or public, or menial, or solitary—all these subordinate, (I am eternally equal with the best—I am not subordinate;)            5   
Me toward the Mexican Sea, or in the Mannahatta, or the Tennessee, or far north, or inland,       
A river man, or a man of the woods, or of any farm-life in These States, or of the coast, or the lakes, or Kanada,       
Me, wherever my life is lived, O to be self-balanced for contingencies!       
O to confront night, storms, hunger, ridicule, accidents, rebuffs, as the trees and animals do.

85. As I lay with Head in your Lap, Camerado



AS I lay with my head in your lap, Camerado,       
The confession I made I resume—what I said to you in the open air I resume:       
I know I am restless, and make others so;       
I know my words are weapons, full of danger, full of death;       
(Indeed I am myself the real soldier;            5   
It is not he, there, with his bayonet, and not the red-striped artilleryman;)       
For I confront peace, security, and all the settled laws, to unsettle them;       
I am more resolute because all have denied me, than I could ever have been had all accepted me;       
I heed not, and have never heeded, either experience, cautions, majorities, nor ridicule;       
And the threat of what is call’d hell is little or nothing to me;     10   
And the lure of what is call’d heaven is little or nothing to me;       
...Dear camerado! I confess I have urged you onward with me, and still urge you, without the least idea what is our destination,       
Or whether we shall be victorious, or utterly quell’d and defeated.

86. Crossing Brooklyn Ferry



1

FLOOD-TIDE below me! I watch you face to face;       
Clouds of the west! sun there half an hour high! I see you also face to face.       
     
Crowds of men and women attired in the usual costumes! how curious you are to me!       
On the ferry-boats, the hundreds and hundreds that cross, returning home, are more curious to me than you suppose;       
And you that shall cross from shore to shore years hence, are more to me, and more in my meditations, than you might suppose.            5   
     
2

The impalpable sustenance of me from all things, at all hours of the day;       
The simple, compact, well-join’d scheme—myself disintegrated, every one disintegrated, yet part of the scheme:       
The similitudes of the past, and those of the future;       
The glories strung like beads on my smallest sights and hearings—on the walk in the street, and the passage over the river;       
The current rushing so swiftly, and swimming with me far away;     10   
The others that are to follow me, the ties between me and them;       
The certainty of others—the life, love, sight, hearing of others.       
     
Others will enter the gates of the ferry, and cross from shore to shore;       
Others will watch the run of the flood-tide;       
Others will see the shipping of Manhattan north and west, and the heights of Brooklyn to the south and east;     15   
Others will see the islands large and small;       
Fifty years hence, others will see them as they cross, the sun half an hour high;       
A hundred years hence, or ever so many hundred years hence, others will see them,       
Will enjoy the sunset, the pouring in of the flood-tide, the falling back to the sea of the ebb-tide.       
     
3

It avails not, neither time or place—distance avails not;     20   
I am with you, you men and women of a generation, or ever so many generations hence;       
I project myself—also I return—I am with you, and know how it is.       
     
Just as you feel when you look on the river and sky, so I felt;       
Just as any of you is one of a living crowd, I was one of a crowd;       
Just as you are refresh’d by the gladness of the river and the bright flow, I was refresh’d;     25   
Just as you stand and lean on the rail, yet hurry with the swift current, I stood, yet was hurried;       
Just as you look on the numberless masts of ships, and the thick-stem’d pipes of steamboats, I look’d.       
     
I too many and many a time cross’d the river, the sun half an hour high;       
I watched the Twelfth-month sea-gulls—I saw them high in the air, floating with motionless wings, oscillating their bodies,       
I saw how the glistening yellow lit up parts of their bodies, and left the rest in strong shadow,     30   
I saw the slow-wheeling circles, and the gradual edging toward the south.       
     
I too saw the reflection of the summer sky in the water,       
Had my eyes dazzled by the shimmering track of beams,       
Look’d at the fine centrifugal spokes of light around the shape of my head in the sun-lit water,       
Look’d on the haze on the hills southward and southwestward,     35   
Look’d on the vapor as it flew in fleeces tinged with violet,       
Look’d toward the lower bay to notice the arriving ships,       
Saw their approach, saw aboard those that were near me,       
Saw the white sails of schooners and sloops—saw the ships at anchor,       
The sailors at work in the rigging, or out astride the spars,     40   
The round masts, the swinging motion of the hulls, the slender serpentine pennants,       
The large and small steamers in motion, the pilots in their pilot-houses,       
The white wake left by the passage, the quick tremulous whirl of the wheels,       
The flags of all nations, the falling of them at sun-set,       
The scallop-edged waves in the twilight, the ladled cups, the frolicsome crests and glistening,     45   
The stretch afar growing dimmer and dimmer, the gray walls of the granite store-houses by the docks,       
On the river the shadowy group, the big steam-tug closely flank’d on each side by the barges—the hay-boat, the belated lighter,       
On the neighboring shore, the fires from the foundry chimneys burning high and glaringly into the night,       
Casting their flicker of black, contrasted with wild red 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;     50   
I project myself a moment to tell you—also I return.       
     
I loved well those cities;       
I 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 forward to them;     55   
(The time will come, though I stop here to-day and to-night.)       
     
5

What is it, then, between us?       
What is the count of the scores or hundreds of years between us?       
     
Whatever it is, it avails not—distance avails not, and place avails not.       
     
6

I too lived—Brooklyn, of ample hills, was mine;     60   
I too walk’d the streets of Manhattan Island, and bathed in the waters around it;       
I too felt the curious abrupt questionings stir within me,       
In the day, among crowds of people, sometimes they came upon me,       
In my walks home late at night, or as I lay in my bed, they came upon me.       
     
I too had been struck from the float forever held in solution;     65   
I too had receiv’d identity by my Body;       
That I was, I knew was of my body—and what I should be, I knew I should be of my body.       
     
7

It is not upon you alone the dark patches fall,       
The dark threw patches down upon me also;       
The best I had done seem’d to me blank and suspicious;     70   
My great thoughts, as I supposed them, were they not in reality meagre? would not people laugh at me?       
     
It is not you alone who know what it is to be evil;       
I am he who knew what it was to be evil;       
I too knitted the old knot of contrariety,       
Blabb’d, blush’d, resented, lied, stole, grudg’d,     75   
Had guile, anger, lust, hot wishes I dared not speak,       
Was wayward, vain, greedy, shallow, sly, cowardly, malignant;       
The wolf, the snake, the hog, not wanting in me,       
The cheating look, the frivolous word, the adulterous wish, not wanting,       
Refusals, hates, postponements, meanness, laziness, none of these wanting.     80   
     
8

But I was Manhattanese, friendly and proud!       
I was call’d by my nighest name by clear loud voices of young men as they saw me approaching or passing,       
Felt their arms on my neck as I stood, or the negligent leaning of their flesh against me as I sat,       
Saw many I loved in the street, or ferry-boat, or public assembly, yet never told them a word,       
Lived the same life with the rest, the same old laughing, gnawing, sleeping,     85   
Play’d the part that still looks back on the actor or actress,       
The same old role, the role that is what we make it, as great as we like,       
Or as small as we like, or both great and small.       
     
9

Closer yet I approach you;       
What thought you have of me, I had as much of you—I laid in my stores in advance;     90   
I consider’d long and seriously of you before you were born.       
     
Who was to know what should come home to me?       
Who knows but I am enjoying this?       
Who knows but I am as good as looking at you now, for all you cannot see me?       
     
It is not you alone, nor I alone;     95   
Not a few races, nor a few generations, nor a few centuries;       
It is that each came, or comes, or shall come, from its due emission,       
From the general centre of all, and forming a part of all:       
Everything indicates—the smallest does, and the largest does;       
A necessary film envelopes all, and envelopes the Soul for a proper time.    100   
     
10

Now I am curious what sight can ever be more stately and admirable to me than my mast-hemm’d Manhattan,       
My river and sun-set, and my scallop-edg’d waves of flood-tide,       
The sea-gulls oscillating their bodies, the hay-boat in the twilight, and the belated lighter;       
Curious what Gods can exceed these that clasp me by the hand, and with voices I love call me promptly and loudly by my nighest name as I approach;       
Curious what is more subtle than this which ties me to the woman or man that looks in my face,    105   
Which fuses me into you now, and pours my meaning into you.       
     
We understand, then, do we not?       
What I promis’d without mentioning it, have you not accepted?       
What the study could not teach—what the preaching could not accomplish, is accomplish’d, is it not?       
What the push of reading could not start, is started by me personally, is it not?    110   
     
11

Flow on, river! flow with the flood-tide, and ebb with the ebb-tide!       
Frolic on, crested and scallop-edg’d waves!       
Gorgeous clouds of the sun-set! drench with your splendor me, or the men and women generations after me;       
Cross from shore to shore, countless crowds of passengers!       
Stand up, tall masts of Mannahatta!—stand up, beautiful hills of Brooklyn!    115   
Throb, baffled and curious brain! throw out questions and answers!       
Suspend here and everywhere, eternal float of solution!       
Gaze, loving and thirsting eyes, in the house, or street, or public assembly!       
Sound out, voices of young men! loudly and musically call me by my nighest name!       
Live, old life! play the part that looks back on the actor or actress!    120   
Play the old role, the role that is great or small, according as one makes it!       
     
Consider, you who peruse me, whether I may not in unknown ways be looking upon you;       
Be firm, rail over the river, to support those who lean idly, yet haste with the hasting current;       
Fly on, sea-birds! fly sideways, or wheel in large circles high in the air;       
Receive the summer sky, you water! and faithfully hold it, till all downcast eyes have time to take it from you;    125   
Diverge, fine spokes of light, from the shape of my head, or any one’s head, in the sun-lit water;       
Come on, ships from the lower bay! pass up or down, white-sail’d schooners, sloops, lighters!       
Flaunt away, flags of all nations! be duly lower’d at sunset;       
Burn high your fires, foundry chimneys! cast black shadows at nightfall! cast red and yellow light over the tops of the houses;       
Appearances, now or henceforth, indicate what you are;    130   
You necessary film, continue to envelop the soul;       
About my body for me, and your body for you, be hung our divinest aromas;       
Thrive, cities! bring your freight, bring your shows, ample and sufficient rivers;       
Expand, being than which none else is perhaps more spiritual;       
Keep your places, objects than which none else is more lasting.    135   
     
12

We descend upon you and all things—we arrest you all;       
We realize the soul only by you, you faithful solids and fluids;       
Through you color, form, location, sublimity, ideality;       
Through you every proof, comparison, and all the suggestions and determinations of ourselves.       
     
You have waited, you always wait, you dumb, beautiful ministers! you novices!    140   
We receive you with free sense at last, and are insatiate henceforward;       
Not you any more shall be able to foil us, or withhold yourselves from us;       
We use you, and do not cast you aside—we plant you permanently within us;       
We fathom you not—we love you—there is perfection in you also;       
You furnish your parts toward eternity;    145   
Great or small, you furnish your parts toward the soul.

87. With Antecedents



1

WITH antecedents;       
With my fathers and mothers, and the accumulations of past ages;       
With all which, had it not been, I would not now be here, as I am:       
With Egypt, India, Phenicia, Greece and Rome;       
With the Kelt, the Scandinavian, the Alb, and the Saxon;            5   
With antique maritime ventures,—with laws, artizanship, wars and journeys;       
With the poet, the skald, the saga, the myth, and the oracle;       
With the sale of slaves—with enthusiasts—with the troubadour, the crusader, and the monk;       
With those old continents whence we have come to this new continent;       
With the fading kingdoms and kings over there;     10   
With the fading religions and priests;       
With the small shores we look back to from our own large and present shores;       
With countless years drawing themselves onward, and arrived at these years;       
You and Me arrived—America arrived, and making this year;       
This year! sending itself ahead countless years to come.     15   
     
2

O but it is not the years—it is I—it is You;       
We touch all laws, and tally all antecedents;       
We are the skald, the oracle, the monk, and the knight—we easily include them, and more;       
We stand amid time, beginningless and endless—we stand amid evil and good;       
All swings around us—there is as much darkness as light;     20   
The very sun swings itself and its system of planets around us;       
Its sun, and its again, all swing around us.       
As for me, (torn, stormy, even as I, amid these vehement days,)       
I have the idea of all, and am all, and believe in all;       
I believe materialism is true, and spiritualism is true—I reject no part.     25   
     
Have I forgotten any part?       
Come to me, whoever and whatever, till I give you recognition.       
     
I respect Assyria, China, Teutonia, and the Hebrews;       
I adopt each theory, myth, god, and demi-god;       
I see that the old accounts, bibles, genealogies, are true, without exception;     30   
I assert that all past days were what they should have been;       
And that they could no-how have been better than they were,       
And that to-day is what it should be—and that America is,       
And that to-day and America could no-how be better than they are.       
     
3

In the name of These States, and in your and my name, the Past,     35   
And in the name of These States, and in your and my name, the Present time.       
     
I know that the past was great, and the future will be great,       
And I know that both curiously conjoint in the present time,       
(For the sake of him I typify—for the common average man’s sake—your sake, if you are he;)       
And that where I am, or you are, this present day, there is the centre of all days, all races,     40   
And there is the meaning, to us, of all that has ever come of races and days, or ever will come.   

88. Now List to my Morning’s Romanza



1

NOW list to my morning’s romanza—I tell the signs of the Answerer;       
To the cities and farms I sing, as they spread in the sunshine before me.       
     
A young man comes to me bearing a message from his brother;       
How shall the young man know the whether and when of his brother?       
Tell him to send me the signs.            5   
     
And I stand before the young man face to face, and take his right hand in my left hand, and his left hand in my right hand,       
And I answer for his brother, and for men, and I answer for him that answers for all, and send these signs.       
     
2

Him all wait for—him all yield up to—his word is decisive and final,       
Him they accept, in him lave, in him perceive themselves, as amid light,       
Him they immerse, and he immerses them.     10   
     
Beautiful women, the haughtiest nations, laws, the landscape, people, animals,       
The profound earth and its attributes, and the unquiet ocean, (so tell I my morning’s romanza;)       
All enjoyments and properties, and money, and whatever money will buy,       
The best farms—others toiling and planting, and he unavoidably reaps,       
The noblest and costliest cities—others grading and building, and he domiciles there;     15   
Nothing for any one, but what is for him—near and far are for him, the ships in the offing,       
The perpetual shows and marches on land, are for him, if they are for any body.       
     
He puts things in their attitudes;       
He puts to-day out of himself, with plasticity and love;       
He places his own city, times, reminiscences, parents, brothers and sisters, associations, employment, politics, so that the rest never shame them afterward, nor assume to command them.     20   
     
He is the answerer:       
What can be answer’d he answers—and what cannot be answer’d, he shows how it cannot be answer’d.       
     
3

A man is a summons and challenge;       
(It is vain to skulk—Do you hear that mocking and laughter? Do you hear the ironical echoes?)       
     
Books, friendships, philosophers, priests, action, pleasure, pride, beat up and down, seeking to give satisfaction;     25   
He indicates the satisfaction, and indicates them that beat up and down also.       
     
Whichever the sex, whatever the season or place, he may go freshly and gently and safely, by day or by night;       
He has the pass-key of hearts—to him the response of the prying of hands on the knobs.       
     
His welcome is universal—the flow of beauty is not more welcome or universal than he is;       
The person he favors by day, or sleeps with at night, is blessed.     30   
     
4

Every existence has its idiom—everything has an idiom and tongue;       
He resolves all tongues into his own, and bestows it upon men, and any man translates, and any man translates himself also;       
One part does not counteract another part—he is the joiner—he sees how they join.       
     
He says indifferently and alike, How are you, friend? to the President at his levee,       
And he says, Good-day, my brother! to Cudge that hoes in the sugar-field,     35   
And both understand him, and know that his speech is right.       
     
He walks with perfect ease in the Capitol,       
He walks among the Congress, and one Representative says to another, Here is our equal, appearing and new.       
     
Then the mechanics take him for a mechanic,       
And the soldiers suppose him to be a soldier, and the sailors that he has follow’d the sea,     40   
And the authors take him for an author, and the artists for an artist,       
And the laborers perceive he could labor with them and love them;       
No matter what the work is, that he is the one to follow it, or has follow’d it,       
No matter what the nation, that he might find his brothers and sisters there.       
     
The English believe he comes of their English stock,     45   
A Jew to the Jew he seems—a Russ to the Russ—usual and near, removed from none.       
     
Whoever he looks at in the traveler’s coffee-house claims him,       
The Italian or Frenchman is sure, and the German is sure, and the Spaniard is sure, and the island Cuban is sure;       
The engineer, the deck-hand on the great lakes, or on the Mississippi, or St. Lawrence, or Sacramento, or Hudson, or Paumanok Sound, claims him.       
     
The gentleman of perfect blood acknowledges his perfect blood;     50   
The insulter, the prostitute, the angry person, the beggar, see themselves in the ways of him—he strangely transmutes them,       
They are not vile any more—they hardly know themselves, they are so grown.

89. The Indications



THE indications, and tally of time;       
Perfect sanity shows the master among philosophs;       
Time, always without flaw, indicates itself in parts;       
What always indicates the poet, is the crowd of the pleasant company of singers, and their words;       
The words of the singers are the hours or minutes of the light or dark—but the words of the maker of poems are the general light and dark;            5   
The maker of poems settles justice, reality, immortality,       
His insight and power encircle things and the human race,       
He is the glory and extract thus far, of things, and of the human race.       
     
The singers do not beget—only the POET begets;       
The singers are welcom’d, understood, appear often enough—but rare has the day been, likewise the spot, of the birth of the maker of poems, the Answerer,     10   
(Not every century, or every five centuries, has contain’d such a day, for all its names.)       
     
The singers of successive hours of centuries may have ostensible names, but the name of each of them is one of the singers,       
The name of each is, eye-singer, ear-singer, head-singer, sweet-singer, echo-singer, parlor-singer, love-singer, or something else.       
     
All this time, and at all times, wait the words of true poems;       
The words of true poems do not merely please,     15   
The true poets are not followers of beauty, but the august masters of beauty;       
The greatness of sons is the exuding of the greatness of mothers and fathers,       
The words of poems are the tuft and final applause of science.       
     
Divine instinct, breadth of vision, the law of reason, health, rudeness of body, withdrawnness,       
Gayety, sun-tan, air-sweetness—such are some of the words of poems.     20   
     
The sailor and traveler underlie the maker of poems, the answerer;       
The builder, geometer, chemist, anatomist, phrenologist, artist—all these underlie the maker of poems, the answerer.       
     
The words of the true poems give you more than poems,       
They give you to form for yourself, poems, religions, politics, war, peace, behavior, histories, essays, romances, and everything else,       
They balance ranks, colors, races, creeds, and the sexes,     25   
They do not seek beauty—they are sought,       
Forever touching them, or close upon them, follows beauty, longing, fain, love-sick.       
     
They prepare for death—yet are they not the finish, but rather the outset,       
They bring none to his or her terminus, or to be content and full;       
Whom they take, they take into space, to behold the birth of stars, to learn one of the meanings,     30   
To launch off with absolute faith—to sweep through the ceaseless rings, and never be quiet again.

90. Poets to Come



POETS to come! orators, singers, musicians to come!       
Not to-day is to justify me, and answer what I am for;       
But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than before known,       
Arouse! Arouse—for you must justify me—you must answer.       
     
I myself but write one or two indicative words for the future,            5   
I but advance a moment, only to wheel and hurry back in the darkness.       
     
I am a man who, sauntering along, without fully stopping, turns a casual look upon you, and then averts his face,       
Leaving it to you to prove and define it,       
Expecting the main things from you.

91. I Hear America Singing



I HEAR America singing, the varied carols I hear;       
Those of mechanics—each one singing his, as it should be, blithe and strong;       
The carpenter singing his, as he measures his plank or beam,       
The mason singing his, as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work;       
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat—the deckhand singing on the steamboat deck;            5   
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench—the hatter singing as he stands;       
The wood-cutter’s song—the ploughboy’s, on his way in the morning, or at the noon intermission, or at sundown;       
The delicious singing of the mother—or of the young wife at work—or of the girl sewing or washing—Each singing what belongs to her, and to none else;       
The day what belongs to the day—At night, the party of young fellows, robust, friendly,       
Singing, with open mouths, their strong melodious songs.