The arm of my friend hanging idly over my shoulder, The hill-side whiten'd with blossoms of the mountain ash, The same, late in autumn-the' hues of red, yellow, drab, purple, and light and dark green, The rich coverlid of the grass-animals and birds-the private untrimm'd bank-the primitive apples-the pebblestones, Beautiful dripping fragments-the negligent list of one after another, as I happen to call them to me, or think of them, The real poems, (what we call poems being merely pictures,) The poems of the privacy of the night, and of men like me, This poem, drooping shy and unseen, that I always carry, and that all men carry, ΙΟ (Know, once for all, avow'd on purpose, wherever are men like me, are our lusty, lurking, masculine poems ;) Love-thoughts, love-juice, love-odor, love-yielding, love-climbers, and the climbing sap, Arms and hands of love-lips of love-phallic thumb of love— breasts of love-bellies press'd and glued together with love, Earth of chaste love-life that is only life after love, The body of my love-the body of the woman I love-the body of the man—the body of the earth, Soft forenoon airs that blow from the south-west, The hairy wild-bee that murmurs and hankers up and downthat gripes the full-grown lady-flower, curves upon her with amorous firm legs, takes his will of her, and holds himself tremulous and tight till he is satisfied, The wet of woods through the early hours, Two sleepers at night lying close together as they sleep, one with an arm slanting down across and below the waist of the other, The smell of apples, aromas from crush'd sage-plant, mint, birch-bark, 20 The boy's longings, the glow and pressure as he confides to me what he was dreaming, The dead leaf whirling its spiral whirl, and falling still and content to the ground, The no-form'd stings that sights, people, objects, sting me with, The hubb'd sting of myself, stinging me as much as it ever can any one, 1 1856-60 read "the gorgeous hues," etc. The sensitive, orbic, underlapp'd brothers, that only privileged feelers may be intimate where they are, The curious roamer, the hand, roaming all over the body-the bashful withdrawing of flesh where the fingers soothingly pause and edge themselves, The limpid liquid within the young man, The vexed corrosion, so pensive and so painful, The torment-the irritable tide that will not be at rest, The like of the same I feel-the like of the same in others, 30 The young man that flushes and flushes, and the young woman that flushes and flushes, The young man that wakes, deep at night, the hot hand seeking to repress what would master him; The mystic amorous night-the strange half-welcome pangs, visions, sweats, The pulse pounding through palms and trembling encircling fingers the young man all color'd, red, ashamed, angry; The souse upon me of my lover the sea, as I lie willing and naked, The merriment of the twin-babes that crawl over the grass in the sun, the mother never turning her vigilant eyes from them, The walnut-trunk, the walnut-husks, and the ripening or ripen'd long-round walnuts; The continence of vegetables, birds, animals, The consequent meanness of me should I skulk or find myself indecent, while birds and animals never once skulk or find themselves indecent ; The great chastity of paternity, to match the great chastity of maternity, 40 The oath of procreation I have sworn-my Adamic and fresh daughters,' The greed that eats me day and night with hungry gnaw, till I saturate what shall produce boys to fill my place when I am through, The wholesome relief, repose, content; And this bunch, pluck'd at random from myself; It has done its work-I tossed it carelessly to fall where it may. 1 "The mystic amorous night" added in 1867. 2 "My Adamic and fresh daughters" added in 1860. ONE HOUR TO MADNESS AND JOY. First published in 1860. ONE hour to madness and joy !' O furious! O confine me not! (What is this that frees me so in storms? What do my shouts amid lightnings and raging winds mean?) O to drink the mystic deliria deeper than any other man! O savage and tender achings! (I bequeath them to you, my children, I tell them to you, for reasons, O bridegroom and bride.) O to be yielded to you, whoever you are, and you to be yielded to me, in defiance of the world!" O to return to Paradise! O bashful and feminine! ΙΟ O to draw you to me—to plant on you for the first time the lips of a determin'd man !' O the puzzle-the thrice-tied knot-the deep and dark pool! O all untied and illumin'd! O to speed where there is space enough and air enough at last! O to be absolv'd from previous ties and conventions--I from mine, and you from yours! O to find a new unthought-of nonchalance with the best of nature! O to have the gag remov'd from one's mouth! O to have the feeling, to-day or any day, I am sufficient as I am! O something unprov'd! something in a trance! O madness amorous! O trembling! O to escape utterly from others' anchors and holds ! To drive free! to love free! to dash reckless and dangerous ! To court destruction with taunts-with invitations ! 20 To ascend-to leap to the heavens of the love indicated to me! 1 Line I added in 1867. 1860. After line 9 reads "(Know I am a man, attracting at any time, her I but look upon, or touch with the tips of my fingers, Or that touches my face, or leans against me.)" "O bashful and feminine !'' added in 1867. 1860. After line II reads "O rich and feminine! O to show you how to realize the blood of life for yourself, whoever you are-and no matter when and where you live." 5 1860 reads "from previous follies and degradations.” To rise thither with my inebriate Soul ! To be lost, if it must be so ! To feed the remainder of life with one hour of fulness and free dom! With one brief hour of madness and joy. WE TWO-HOW LONG WE WERE FOOL'D. First published in 1860. 'WE two-how long we were fool'd! Now transmuted, we swiftly escape, as Nature escapes ;2 We are bedded in the ground-we are rocks; We are oaks we grow in the openings side by side; We browse-we are two among the wild herds, spontaneous as any; We are two fishes swimming in the sea together; We are what the locust blossoms are-we drop scent around the lanes, mornings and evenings; We are also the coarse smut of beasts, vegetables, minerals ;3 ΙΟ We are two predatory hawks--we soar above, and look down; We are two resplendent suns-we it is who balance ourselves, orbic and stellar-we are as two comets; We prowl fang'd and four-footed in the woods-we spring on prey ; We are two clouds, forenoons and afternoons, driving overhead; We are seas mingling-we are two of those cheerful waves, rolling over each other, and interwetting each other; We are what the atmosphere is, transparent, receptive, pervious, impervious: We are snow, rain, cold, darkness-we are each product and influence of the globe; 1 1860 begins "You and I-what the earth is, we are, We two," etc. 21860 reads "Now delicious, transmuted, swiftly we escape, as Nature escapes." 1860. After line 10 reads "We are what the howing wet of the Tennessee is we are two peaks of the Blue Mountains, rising up in Virginia." We have circled and circled till we have arrived home again— we two have; We have voided all but freedom, and all but our own joy. OUT OF THE ROLLING OCEAN, THE CROWD. First published in "Drum Taps," 1865. I Out of the rolling ocean, the crowd, came a drop gently to me, Whispering, I love you, before long I die, I have travel d a long way, merely to look on you, to touch you, For I could not die till I once look'd on you, For I fear'd I might afterward lose you. 2 (Now we have met, we have look'd, we are safe; Return in peace to the ocean, my love; I too am part of that ocean, my love—we are not so much separated; Behold the great rondure—the cohesion of all, how perfect! ΙΟ As for an hour, carrying us diverse-yet cannot carry us diverse for ever; Be not impatient-a little space-Know you, I salute the air, the ocean and the land, Every day, at sundown, for your dear sake, my love.) NATIVE MOMENTS. First published in 1860. NATIVE Moments! when you come upon me-Ah you are here now! Give me now libidinous joys only! Give me the drench of my passions! Give me life coarse and rank! To-day, I go consort with nature's darlings-to-night too; I am for those who believe in loose delights-I share the midnight orgies of young men ; I dance with the dancers. and drink with the drinkers; |