I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven. Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord, A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropped, Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark, and say Whose? Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation. Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic, And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones, Growing among black folks as among white, Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I receive them the same. And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves. Tenderly will I use you curling grass, It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men, My foothold is tenoned and mortised in granite, I laugh at what you call dissolution, HEROES I UNDERSTAND the large hearts of heroes, The courage of present times and all times, How the skipper saw the crowded and rudderless wreck of the steamship, and Death chasing it up and down the storm, How he knuckled tight and gave not back an inch, and was faithful of days and faithful of nights, And chalked in large letters on a board, Be of good cheer, we will not desert you; How he followed with them and tacked with them three days and would not give it up, How he saved the drifting company at last, How the lank loose-gowned women looked when boated from the side of their prepared graves, How the silent old-faced infants, and the lifted sick, and the sharp-lipped unshaved men; All this I swallow, it tastes good, I like it well, it becomes mine, I am the man, I suffered, I was there. Agonies are one of my changes of gar ments, I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person, My hurts turn livid upon me as I lean on a cane and observe. I am the mashed fireman with breast-bone broken, Tumbling walls buried me in their debris, Heat and smoke I inspired, I heard the yelling shouts of my comrades, I heard the distant click of their picks and shovels; They have cleared the beams away, they tenderly lift me forth. I lie in the night air in my red shirt, the pervading hush is for my sake, Painless after all I lie exhausted but not so unhappy, White and beautiful are the faces around me, the heads are bared of their firecaps, The kneeling crowd fades with the light of the torches. Distant and dead resuscitate, They show as the dial or move as the hands of me, I am the clock myself. I am an old artillerist, I tell of my fort's bombardment, I am there again. Again the long roll of the drummers, Again the attacking cannon, mortars, Again to my listening ears the cannon responsive. I take part, I see and hear the whole, The cries, curses, roar, the plaudits for well-aimed shots, The ambulanza slowly passing trailing its red drip, Workmen searching after damages, making indispensable repairs, The fall of grenades through the rent roof, the fan-shaped explosion, The whizz of limbs, heads, stone, wood, iron, high in the air. Again gurgles the mouth of my dying general, he furiously waves with his hand, He gasps through the clot Mind not me We had received some eighteen pound shots under the water, On our lower gun-deck two large pieces had burst at the first fire, killing all around and blowing up overhead. Fighting at sun-down, fighting at dark, Ten o'clock at night, the full moon well up, our leaks on the gain, and five feet of water reported, The master-at-arms loosing the prisoners confined in the after-hold to give them a chance for themselves. The transit to and from the magazine is now stopped by the sentinels, They see so many strange faces they do not know whom to trust. Our frigate takes fire, The other asks if we demand quarter? If our colors are struck and the fighting done? Now I laugh content for I hear the voice of my little captain, We have not struck, he composedly cries, we have just begun our part of the fighting. Only three guns are in use, One is directed by the captain himself against the enemy's mainmast, Two well served with grape and canister silence his musketry and clear his decks. The tops alone second the fire of this little battery, especially the main-top, They hold out bravely during the whole of the action. Not a moment's cease, The leaks gain fast on the pumps, the fire eats toward the powder-magazine. One of the pumps has been shot away, it is generally thought we are sinking. Serene stands the little captain, He is not hurried, his voice is neither high nor low, His eyes give more light to us than our battle-lanterns. Toward twelve there in the beams of the moon they surrender to us. Faithful and friendly the arms that have helped me. Cycles ferried my cradle, rowing and rowing like cheerful boatmen, For room to me stars kept aside in their own rings, They sent influences to look after what was to hold me. Before I was born out of my mother generations guided me, My embryo has never been torpid, nothing could overlay it. For it the nebula cohered to an orb, mouths and deposited it with care. All forces have been steadily employed to complete and delight me, Now on this spot I stand with my robust soul. Old age superbly rising! O welcome, in effable grace of dying days! Every condition promulges not only itself, it promulges what grows after and out of itself, And the dark hush promulges as much as any. These demanding to have them, (tired with ceaseless excitement, and racked by the war-strife) These to procure incessantly asking, rising in cries from my heart, While yet incessantly asking still I adhere to my city, Day upon day and year upon year, O city, walking your streets, Where you hold me enchained a certain time refusing to give me up, Yet giving to make me glutted, enriched of soul, you give me forever faces; (0 I see what I sought to escape, confronting, reversing my cries, I see my own soul trampling down what it asked for.) Keep your splendid silent sun, Keep your woods, O Nature, and the quiet places by the woods, Keep your fields of clover and timothy, and your corn-fields and orchards, Keep the blossoming buckwheat fields where the Ninth-month bees hum; Give me faces and streets give me these phantoms incessant and endless along the trottoirs ! Give me interminable eyes-give me women give me comrades and lovers by the thousand ! Let me see new ones every day — let me hold new ones by the hand every day! Give me such shows - give me the streets of Manhattan ! Give me Broadway, with the soldiers marching-give me the sound of the trumpets and drums! (The soldiers in companies or regiments some starting away flushed and reckless, Some, their time up, returning with thinned ranks, young, yet very old, worn, marching, noticing nothing;) Give me the shores and wharves heavyfringed with black ships! O such for me! O an intense life, full to repletion and varied ! The life of the theatre, bar-room, huge hotel, for me! The saloon of the steamer ! The crowded excursion for me! The torchlight procession! The dense brigade bound for the war, with high-piled military wagons following; People, endless, streaming, with strong voices, passions, pageants, Manhattan streets with their powerful throbs, with beating drums as now, The endless and noisy chorus, the rustle and clank of muskets (even the sight of the wounded), Manhattan crowds, with their turbulent musical chorus ! Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me. Numberless crowded streets, high growths of iron, slender, strong, light, splendidly uprising toward clear skies, Tides swift and ample, well-loved by me, towards 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-modelled, The down-town streets, the jobbers' houses of business, the houses of business of the ship-merchants and moneybrokers, 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, The mechanics of the city, the masters, well-formed, beautiful-faced, looking you straight in the eyes, Trottoirs thronged, vehicles, Broadway, the women, the shops and shows, A million people · manners free and su perb-open voices - hospitality the most courageous and friendly young men, |