Examine these limbs, red, black, or white-they are so1 cunning in tendon and nerve; They shall be stript, that you may see them. Exquisite senses, life-lit eyes, pluck, volition, Flakes of breast-muscle, pliant back-bone and neck, flesh not flabby, good-sized arms and legs, And wonders within there yet. Within there runs blood," The same old blood! The same red-running blood! There swells and jets a heart-there all passions, desires, reach ings, aspirations ; IIO Do you think they are not there because they are not express'd in parlors and lecture-rooms? This is not only one man-this is the father of those who shall be fathers in their turns ; In him the start of populous states and rich republics; Of him countless immortal lives, with countless embodiments and enjoyments. How do you know who shall come from the offspring of his offspring through the centuries? Who might you find you have come from yourself, if you could trace back through the centuries? A woman's Body at auction! 8 She too is not only herself-she is the teeming mother of mothers; She is the bearer of them that shall grow and be mates to the mothers.* Have you ever loved the Body of a woman 11855. For "so" reads "very." 2 1855 reads "runs his blood." 3 1855 reads "his heart." 120 1855'56 '60. After line 119 read "Her daughters or their daughters' daughters-who knows who shall mate with them? Who knows through the centuries what heroes may come from them? In them and of them natal love-in them the divine mystery-the same old beautiful mystery." 5 1855 reads "Have you ever loved a woman?" Have you ever loved the Body of a man?1 Your father-where is your father? Your mother-is she living? have you been much with her? and has she been much with you? -Do you not see that these are exactly the same to all, in all nations and times, all over the earth? If any thing is sacred,' the human body is sacred, And the glory and sweet of a man, is the token of manhood untainted; And in man or woman, a clean, strong, firm-fibred body, is beautiful as the most beautiful face. Have you seen the fool that corrupted his own live body? or the fool that corrupted her own live body? For they do not conceal themselves, and cannot conceal themselves.' 9* O my Body! I dare not desert the likes of you in other men and women, nor the likes of the parts of you; 130 I believe the likes of you are to stand or fall with the likes of the Soul, (and that they are the Soul ;)" I believe the likes of you shall stand or fall with my poems-and that they are poems, Man's, woman's, child's, youth's, wife's, husband's, mother's, father's, young man's, young woman's poems; Head, neck, hair, ears, drop and tympan of the ears, Eyes, eye-fringes, iris of the eye, eye-brows, and the waking o sleeping of the lids, Mouth, tongue, lips, teeth, roof of the mouth, jaws, and the jawhinges, Nose, nostrils of the nose, and the partition, Cheeks, temples, forehead, chin, throat, back of the neck, neck-slue, Strong shoulders, manly beard, scapula, hind-shoulders, and the ample side-round of the chest. 1 Lines 121-122 added in 1856. 2 1855 reads "If life and the soul are sacred." 3 After line 129. 1855 reads "Who degrades or defiles the living human body is cursed, Who degrades or defiles the body of the dead is not more cursed." Which ends the poem of that edition. Line 130 to end added in 1856. "(and they are the Soul)" added in 1860. Upper-arm, arm-pit, elbow-socket, lower-arm, arm-sinews, arm bones, 140 Wrist and wrist-joints, hand, palm, knuckles, thumb, fore-finger, finger-balls, finger-joints, finger nails, Broad breast-front, curling hair of the breast, breast-bone, breastside, Ribs, belly, back-bone, joints of the back-bone, Hips, hip-sockets, hip-strength, inward and outward round, man-balls, man-root, Strong set of thighs, well carrying the trunk above, All attitudes, all the shapeliness, all the belongings of my or your body, or of any one's body, male or female, The lung-sponges, the stomach-sac, the bowels sweet and clean, The brain in its folds inside the skull-frame, 150 Sympathies, heart-valves, palate-valves, sexuality, maternity, Womanhood, and all that is a woman—and the man that comes from woman, The womb, the teats, nipples, breast-milk, tears, laughter, weeping, love-looks, love-perturbations and risings, The voice, articulation, language, whispering, shouting aloud, Food, drink, pulse, digestion, sweat, sleep, walking, swimming, Poise on the hips, leaping, reclining, embracing, arm-curving and tightening, The continual changes of the flex of the mouth, and around the eyes, The skin, the sun-burnt shade, freckles, hair, The curious sympathy one feels, when feeling with the hand the naked meat of1 the body, The circling rivers, the breath, and breathing it in and out, 160 The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and thence downward toward the knees, The thin red jellies within you, or within me—the bones, and the marrow in the bones, The exquisite realization of health; OI say, these are not the parts and poems of the Body only, but of the Soul, OI say now these are the Soul !2 1 1856 '60 read "meat of his own body or another person's body." If these are not the soul what is the soul ?” A WOMAN WAITS FOR ME. First published in 1856 under title of "Poem of Procreation." 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. Sex contains all, Bodies, Souls, meanings, proofs, purities, delicacies, results, promulgations, Songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk; All hopes, benefactions, bestowals, All the passions, loves, beauties, delights of the earth, All the governments, judges, gods, follow'd persons of the earth, These are contain'd in sex, as parts of itself, and justifications of itself. Without shame the man I like knows and avows the deliciousness of his sex, Without shame the woman I like knows and avows hers.1 Now I will dismiss myself from impassive women, ΙΟ I will go stay with her who waits for me, and with those women that are warm-blooded and sufficient for me; I see that they understand me, and do not deny me; I see that they are worthy of me—I will be the robust husband of those women. They are not one jot less than I am, They are tann'd in the face by shining suns and blowing winds, They are ultimate in their own right-they are calm, clear, wellpossess'd of themselves. 20 1 1856 '60. After line II read "O I will fetch bully breeds of children yet!" 1856 adds "They cannot be fetched, I say, on less terms than mine, Electric growth from the male, and rich ripe fibre from the female, are the I draw you close to me, you women! I cannot let you go, I would do you good, I am for you, and you are for me, not only for our own sake, but for others' sakes; Envelop'd in you sleep greater heroes and bards, It is I, you women-I make my way, I am stern, acrid, large, undissuadable-but I love you, I do not hurt you any more than is necessary for you, I pour the stuff to start sons and daughters fit for These StatesI press with slow rude muscle, I brace myself effectually-I listen to no entreaties, 30 I dare not withdraw till I deposit what has so long accumulated within me. Through you I drain the pent-up rivers of myself, In you I wrap a thousand onward years, On you I graft the grafts of the best-beloved of me and America, The drops I distil upon you shall grow1 fierce and athletic girls, new artists, musicians, and singers, The babes I beget upon you are to beget babes in their turn, ings, I shall expect them to interpenetrate with others, as I and you interpenetrate now, I shall count on the fruits of the gushing showers of them, as I count on the fruits of the gushing showers I give now, I shall look for loving crops from the birth, life, death, immortality, I plant so lovingly now. 40 SPONTANEOUS ME. First published in 1856 under the title of "Bunch Poem." SPONTANEOUS me, Nature," 3 4 The loving day, the mounting sun, the friend I am happy with,5 1 1855. For "shall grow" reads "are drops of." 2 Line I added in 1860. "The loving day" added in 1860. 4 "the mounting sun" added in 1867. "The friend I am happy with," begins poem in 1856. |