Solitary, the thrush, The hermit, withdrawn to himself, avoiding the settle ments, Sings by himself a song. Song of the bleeding throat! Death's outlet song of life-for well, dear brother, I know, If thou wast not gifted to sing, thou wouldst surely die. 5. Over the breast of the spring, the land, amid cities, Amid lanes, and through old woods (where lately the violets peeped from the ground, spotting the grey debris ;) Amid the grass in the fields each side of the lanes— passing the endless grass; Passing the yellow-speared wheat, every grain from its shroud in the dark-brown fields uprising; Passing the apple-tree blows of white and pink in the orchards; Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest in the grave, 6. Coffin that passes through lanes and streets, Through day and night, with the great cloud darkening the land, With the pomp of the inlooped flags, with the cities draped in black, With the show of the States themselves, as of crapeveiled women, standing, With processions long and winding, and the flambeaus of the night, With the countless torches lit-with the silent sea of faces, and the unbared heads, With the waiting depot, the arriving coffin, and the sombre faces, With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and solemn ; With all the mournful voices of the dirges poured around the coffin, The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs- With the tolling, tolling bells' perpetual clang; I give you my sprig of lilac. 7. (Nor for you, for one, alone; Blossoms and branches green to coffins all I bring: For fresh as the morning-thus would I carol a song for you, O sane and sacred death. All over bouquets of roses, O death! I cover you over with roses and early lilies; 8. O western orb, sailing the heaven! Now I know what you must have meant, as a month since we walked, As we walked up and down in the dark blue so mystic, As we walked in silence the transparent shadowy night, As I saw you had something to tell, as you bent to me night after night, As you drooped from the sky low down, as if to my side, while the other stars all looked on; As we wandered together the solemn night (for some thing, I know not what, kept me from sleep ;) As the night advanced, and I saw on the rim of the west, ere you went, how full you were of woe; As I stood on the rising ground in the breeze, in the cold transparent night, As I watched where you passed and was lost in the netherward black of the night, As my soul in its trouble, dissatisfied, sank, as where you, sad orb, Concluded, dropped in the night, and was gone. 9. Sing on, there in the swamp! O singer bashful and tender! I hear your notes-I hear your call; I hear I come presently-I understand you; But a moment I linger-for the lustrous star has detained me; The star, my departing comrade, holds and detains me. IO. O how shall I warble myself for the dead one there I loved? And how shall I deck my song for the large sweet soul that has gone? And what shall my perfume be for the grave of him I love? Sea-winds, blown from east and west, Blown from the eastern sea, and blown from the western sea, till there on the prairies meeting: These, and with these, and the breath of my chant, II. O what shall I hang on the chamber-walls? And what shall the pictures be that I hang on the walls, To adorn the burial-house of him I love? Pictures of growing spring, and farms, and homes, With the Fourth-month eve at sundown, and the grey smoke lucid and bright, With floods of the yellow gold of the gorgeous, indolent, sinking sun, burning, expanding the air; With the fresh sweet herbage under foot, and the pale green leaves of the trees prolific; In the distance the flowing glaze, the breast of the river, with a wind-dapple here and there; With ranging hills on the banks, with many a line against the sky, and shadows; And the city at hand, with dwellings so dense, and stacks of chimneys, And all the scenes of life, and the workshops, and the workmen homeward returning. 12. Lo! body and soul! this land! Mighty Manhattan, with spires, and the sparkling and hurrying tides, and the ships; The varied and ample land-the South and the North in the light-Ohio's shores, and flashing Mis souri, And ever the far-spreading prairies, covered with grass and corn. Lo! the most excellent sun, so calm and haughty; The miracle, spreading, bathing all-the fulfilled noon; The coming eve, delicious-the welcome night, and the stars, Over my cities shining all, enveloping man and land. 13. Sing on! sing on, you grey-brown bird! Sing from the swamps, the recesses-pour your chant from the bushes; Limitless out of the dusk, out of the cedars and pines. Sing on, dearest brother-warble your reedy song; O liquid, and free, and tender! O wild and loose to my soul! O wondrous singer! soon depart ;) Yet the lilac, with mastering odour, holds me. 14. Now while I sat in the day, and looked forth, In the close of the day, with its light, and the fields of spring, and the farmer preparing his crops, In the large unconscious scenery of my land, with its lakes and forests, In the heavenly aerial beauty (after the perturbed winds, and the storms;) Under the arching heavens of the afternoon swift passing, and the voices of children and women, The many-moving sea-tides,-and I saw the ships how they sailed, And the summer approaching with riches, and the fields all busy with labour, And the infinite separate houses, how they all went on, each with its meals and minutia of daily usages; And the streets, how their throbbings throbbed, and the cities pent-lo! then and there, Falling upon them all, and among them all, enveloping me with the rest, Appeared the cloud; appeared the long black trail; And I knew Death, its Thought, and the sacred Knowledge of Death. 15. Then with the Knowledge of Death as walking one side of me, And the Thought of Death close-walking the other side of me, And I in the middle, as with companions, and as holding the hands of companions, I fled forth to the hiding receiving night, that talks not, Down to the shores of the water, the path by the swamp in the dimness, To the solemn shadowy cedars, and ghostly pines so still. And the singer, so shy to the rest, received me; |