158. Race of Veterans



RACE of veterans! Race of victors!       
Race of the soil, ready for conflict! race of the conquering march!       
(No more credulity’s race, abiding-temper’d race;)       
Race henceforth owning no law but the law of itself;       
Race of passion and the storm.

159. This Compost



1

SOMETHING startles me where I thought I was safest;       
I withdraw from 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.            5   
     
O how can it be that the ground does not sicken?       
How can you be alive, you growths of spring?       
How can you furnish health, you blood of herbs, roots, orchards, grain?       
Are they not continually putting distemper’d corpses within you?       
Is not every continent work’d over and over with sour dead?     10   
     
Where have you disposed of their carcasses?       
Those drunkards and gluttons of so many generations;       
Where have you drawn off all the foul liquid and meat?       
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 underneath;     15   
I am sure I shall expose some of the foul meat.       
     
2

Behold this compost! behold it well!       
Perhaps every mite has once form’d part of a sick person—Yet behold!       
The grass of spring covers the prairies,       
The bean bursts noislessly through the mould in the garden,     20   
The delicate spear of the onion pierces upward,       
The apple-buds cluster together on the apple-branches,       
The resurrection of the wheat appears with pale visage out of its graves,       
The tinge awakes over the willow-tree and the mulberry-tree,       
The he-birds carol mornings and evenings, while the she-birds sit on their nests,     25   
The young of poultry break through the hatch’d eggs,       
The new-born of animals appear—the calf is dropt from the cow, the colt from the mare,       
Out of its little hill faithfully rise the potato’s dark green leaves,       
Out of its hill rises the yellow maize-stalk—the lilacs bloom in the door-yards;       
The summer growth is innocent and disdainful above all those strata of sour dead.     30   
     
What chemistry!       
That the winds are really not infectious,       
That this is no cheat, this transparent green-wash of the sea, which is so amorous after me,       
That it is safe to allow it to lick my naked body all over with its tongues,       
That it will not endanger me with the fevers that have deposited themselves in it,     35   
That all is clean forever and forever.       
That the cool drink from the well tastes so good,       
That blackberries are so flavorous and juicy,       
That the fruits of the apple-orchard, and of the orange-orchard—that melons, grapes, peaches, plums, will none of them poison me,       
That when I recline on the grass I do not catch any disease,     40   
Though probably every spear of grass rises out of what was once a catching disease.       
     
3

Now I am terrified at the Earth! it is that calm and patient,       
It grows such sweet things out of such corruptions,       
It turns harmless and stainless on its axis, with such endless successions of diseas’d corpses,       
It distils such exquisite winds out of such infused fetor,     45   
It renews with such unwitting looks, its prodigal, annual, sumptuous crops,       
It gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such leavings from them at last.

160. Unnamed Lands



NATIONS ten thousand years before These States, and many times ten thousand years before These States;       
Garner’d clusters of ages, that men and women like us grew up and travel’d their course, and pass’d on;       
What vast-built cities—what orderly republics—what pastoral tribes and nomads;       
What histories, rulers, heroes, perhaps transcending all others;       
What laws, customs, wealth, arts, traditions;            5   
What sort of marriage—what costumes—what physiology and phrenology;       
What of liberty and slavery among them—what they thought of death and the soul;       
Who were witty and wise—who beautiful and poetic—who brutish and undevelop’d;       
Not a mark, not a record remains—And yet all remains.       
     
O I know that those men and women were not for nothing, any more than we are for nothing;     10   
I know that they belong to the scheme of the world every bit as much as we now belong to it, and as all will henceforth belong to it.       
     
Afar they stand—yet near to me they stand,       
Some with oval countenances, learn’d and calm,       
Some naked and savage—Some like huge collections of insects,       
Some in tents—herdsmen, patriarchs, tribes, horsemen,     15   
Some prowling through woods—Some living peaceably on farms, laboring, reaping, filling barns,       
Some traversing paved avenues, amid temples, palaces, factories, libraries, shows, courts, theatres, wonderful monuments.       
     
Are those billions of men really gone?       
Are those women of the old experience of the earth gone?       
Do their lives, cities, arts, rest only with us?     20   
Did they achieve nothing for good, for themselves?       
     
I believe of all those billions of men and women that fill’d the unnamed lands, every one exists this hour, here or elsewhere, invisible to us, in exact proportion to what he or she grew from in life, and out of what he or she did, felt, became, loved, sinn’d, in life.       
     
I believe that was not the end of those nations, or any person of them, any more than this shall be the end of my nation, or of me;       
Of their languages, governments, marriage, literature, products, games, wars, manners, crimes, prisons, slaves, heroes, poets, I suspect their results curiously await in the yet unseen world—counterparts of what accrued to them in the seen world.       
I suspect I shall meet them there,     25   
I suspect I shall there find each old particular of those unnamed lands.

161. Mannahatta



I WAS asking for something specific and perfect for my city,       
Whereupon, lo! upsprang the aboriginal name!       
     
Now I see what there is in a name, a word, liquid, sane, unruly, musical, self-sufficient;       
I see that the word of my city is that word up there,       
Because I see that word nested in nests of water-bays, superb, with tall and wonderful spires,            5   
Rich, hemm’d thick all around with sailships and steamships—an island sixteen miles long, solid-founded,       
Numberless crowded streets—high growths of iron, slender, strong, light, splendidly uprising toward clear skies;       
Tide swift and ample, well-loved by me, toward sundown,       
The flowing sea-currents, the little islands, larger adjoining islands, the heights, the villas,       
The countless masts, the white shore-steamers, the lighters, the ferry-boats, the black sea-steamers well-model’d;     10   
The down-town streets, the jobbers’ houses of business—the houses of business of the ship-merchants, and money-brokers—the river-streets;       
Immigrants arriving, fifteen or twenty thousand in a week;       
The carts hauling goods—the manly race of drivers of horses—the brown-faced sailors;       
The summer air, the bright sun shining, and the sailing clouds aloft;       
The winter snows, the sleigh-bells—the broken ice in the river, passing along, up or down, with the flood tide or ebb-tide;     15   
The mechanics of the city, the masters, well-form’d, beautiful-faced, looking you straight in the eyes;       
Trottoirs throng’d—vehicles—Broadway—the women—the shops and shows,       
The parades, processions, bugles playing, flags flying, drums beating;       
A million people—manners free and superb—open voices—hospitality—the most courageous and friendly young men;       
The free city! no slaves! no owners of slaves!     20   
The beautiful city, the city of hurried and sparkling waters! the city of spires and masts!       
The city nested in bays! my city!       
The city of such women, I am mad to be with them! I will return after death to be with them!       
The city of such young men, I swear I cannot live happy, without I often go talk, walk, eat, drink, sleep, with them!

162. Old Ireland



FAR hence, amid an isle of wondrous beauty,       
Crouching over a grave, an ancient, sorrowful mother,       
Once a queen—now lean and tatter’d, seated on the ground,       
Her old white hair drooping dishevel’d round her shoulders;       
At her feet fallen an unused royal harp,            5   
Long silent—she too long silent—mourning her shrouded hope and heir;       
Of all the earth her heart most full of sorrow, because most full of love.       
     
Yet a word, ancient mother;       
You need crouch there no longer or the cold ground, with forehead between your knees;       
O you need not sit there, veil’d in your old white hair, so dishevel’d;     10   
For know you, the one you mourn is not in that grave;       
It was an illusion—the heir, the son you love, was not really dead;       
The Lord is not dead—he is risen again, young and strong, in another country;       
Even while you wept there by your fallen harp, by the grave,       
What you wept for, was translated, pass’d from the grave,     15   
The winds favor’d, and the sea sail’d it,       
And now with rosy and new blood,       
Moves to-day in a new country.

163. To Oratists



TO oratists—to male or female,       
Vocalism, measure, concentration, determination, and the divine power to use words.       
Are you full-lung’d and limber-lipp’d from long trial? from vigorous practice? from physique?       
Do you move in these broad lands as broad as they?       
Come duly to the divine power to use words?            5   
     
For only at last, after many years—after chastity, friendship, procreation, prudence, and nakedness;       
After treading ground and breasting river and lake;       
After a loosen’d throat—after absorbing eras, temperaments, races—after knowledge, freedom, crimes;       
After complete faith—after clarifyings, elevations, and removing obstructions;       
After these, and more, it is just possible there comes to a man, a woman, the divine power to use words.     10   
     
Then toward that man or that woman, swiftly hasten all—None refuse, all attend;       
Armies, ships, antiquities, the dead, libraries, paintings, machines, cities, hate, despair, amity, pain, theft, murder, aspiration, form in close ranks;       
They debouch as they are wanted to march obediently through the mouth of that man, or that woman.       
     
.... O I see arise orators fit for inland America;       
And I see it is as slow to become an orator as to become a man;     15   
And I see that all power is folded in a great vocalism.       
     
Of a great vocalism, the merciless light thereof shall pour, and the storm rage,       
Every flash shall be a revelation, an insult,       
The glaring flame on depths, on heights, on suns, on stars,       
On the interior and exterior of man or woman,     20   
On the laws of Nature—on passive materials,       
On what you called death—(and what to you therefore was death,       
As far as there can be death.)

164. A Hand-Mirror



HOLD it up sternly! See this it sends back! (Who is it? Is it you?)       
Outside fair costume—within ashes and filth,       
No more a flashing eye—no more a sonorous voice or springy step;       
Now some slave’s eye, voice, hands, step,       
A drunkard’s breath, unwholesome eater’s face, venerealee’s flesh,            5   
Lungs rotting away piecemeal, stomach sour and cankerous,       
Joints rheumatic, bowels clogged with abomination,       
Blood circulating dark and poisonous streams,       
Words babble, hearing and touch callous,       
No brain, no heart left—no magnetism of sex;     10   
Such, from one look in this looking-glass ere you go hence,       
Such a result so soon—and from such a beginning!

165. Germs



FORMS, qualities, lives, humanity, language, thoughts,       
The ones known, and the ones unknown—the ones on the stars,       
The stars themselves, some shaped, others unshaped,       
Wonders as of those countries—the soil, trees, cities, inhabitants, whatever they may be,       
Splendid suns, the moons and rings, the countless combinations and effects;            5   
Such-like, and as good as such-like, visible here or anywhere, stand provided for in a handful of space, which I extend my arm and half enclose with my hand;       
That contains the start of each and all—the virtue, the germs of all.

166. O Me! O Life!



O ME! O life!... of the questions of these recurring;       
Of the endless trains of the faithless—of cities fill’d with the foolish;       
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)       
Of eyes that vainly crave the light—of the objects mean—of the struggle ever renew’d;       
Of the poor results of all—of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me;            5   
Of the empty and useless years of the rest—with the rest me intertwined;       
The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?       
     
Answer.

That you are here—that life exists, and identity;       
That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.

167. Thoughts



OF Public Opinion;       
Of a calm and cool fiat, sooner or later, (How impassive! How certain and final!)       
Of the President with pale face, asking secretly to himself, What will the people say at last?       
Of the frivolous Judge—Of the corrupt Congressman, Governor, Mayor—Of such as these, standing helpless and exposed;       
Of the mumbling and screaming priest—(soon, soon deserted;)            5   
Of the lessening, year by year, of venerableness, and of the dicta of officers, statutes, pulpits, schools;       
Of the rising forever taller and stronger and broader, of the intuitions of men and women, and of self-esteem, and of personality;       
—Of the New World—Of the Democracies, resplendent, en-masse;       
Of the conformity of politics, armies, navies, to them and to me,       
Of the shining sun by them—Of the inherent light, greater than the rest,     10   
Of the envelopment of all by them, and of the effusion of all from them