9.

Of and in all these things,

I have dreamed that we are not to be changed so much, nor the law of us changed,

I have dreamed that heroes and good-doers shall be under the present and past law,

And that murderers, drunkards, liars, shall be under the present and past law,

For I have dreamed that the law they are under now is enough.

If otherwise all came but to ashes of dung,

If maggots and rats ended us, then Alarum! for we are betrayed

Then indeed suspicion of death.

Do you suspect death? If I were to suspect death, I should die now;

Do you think I could walk pleasantly and well-suited toward annihilation ?

IO.

Pleasantly and well-suited I walk;

Whither I walk I cannot define, but I know it is good:
The whole universe indicates that it is good,
The past and the present indicate that it is good.

How beautiful and perfect are the animals!

How perfect the earth, and the minutest thing upon it! What is called good is perfect, and what is called bad is just as perfect,

The vegetables and minerals are all perfect, and the imponderable fluids are perfect;

Slowly and surely they have passed on to this, and slowly and surely they yet pass on.

II.

I swear I think now that everything without exception. has an eternal Soul !

The trees have, rooted in the ground! the weeds of the

sea have! the animals!

I swear I think there is nothing but immortality! That the exquisite scheme is for it, and the nebulous float is for it, and the cohering is for it;

And all preparation is for it! and identity is for it! and life and materials are altogether for it!

A DREAM.

Of him I love day and night, I dreamed I heard he was dead;

And I dreamed I went where they had buried him I love-but he was not in that place;

And I dreamed I wandered, searching among burialplaces, to find him ;

And I found that every place was a burial-place; The houses full of life were equally full of death (this house is now);

The streets, the shipping, the places of amusement, the Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, the Mannahatta, were as full of the dead as of the living,

And fuller, O vastly fuller, of the dead than of the living; -And what I dreamed I will henceforth tell to every person and age,

And I stand henceforth bound to what I dreamed; And now I am willing to disregard burial-places, and dispense with them;

And if the memorials of the dead were put up indifferently everywhere, even in the room where I eat or sleep, I should be satisfied;

And if the corpse of any one I love, or if my own corpse, be duly rendered to powder, and poured in the sea, I shall be satisfied;

Or if it be distributed to the winds, I shall be satisfied.

THE LAST INVOCATION

AT the last, tenderly,

I.

From the walls of the powerful, fortressed house, From the clasp of the knitted locks-from the keep of the well-closed doors,

Let me be wafted.

2.

Let me glide noiselessly forth;

With the key of softness unlock the locks-with a

Tenderly be not impatient!

(Strong is your hold, O mortal flesh!

Strong is your hold, O love!)

SEA-SHORE MEMORIES.

I.

OUT of the cradle endlessly rocking,

Out of the mocking-bird's throat, the musical shuttle,
Out of the Ninth-month midnight,

Over the sterile sands, and the fields beyond, where the child, leaving his bed, wandered alone, bareheaded, barefoot,

Down from the showered halo,

Up from the mystic play of shadows, twining and twisting as if they were alive,

Out from the patches of briars and blackberries,
From the memories of the bird that chanted to me,
From your memories, sad brother-from the fitful
risings and fallings I heard,

From under that yellow half-moon, late-risen, and swollen as if with tears,

From those beginning notes of sickness and love, there in the transparent mist,

From the thousand responses of my heart, never to

cease,

From the myriad thence-aroused words,

From the word stronger and more delicious than any,
From such, as now they start, the scene revisiting,
As a flock, twittering, rising, or overhead passing,
Borne hither-ere all eludes me, hurriedly,

A man-yet by these tears a little boy again,
Throwing myself on the sand, confronting the waves,
I, chanter of pains and joys, uniter of here and hereafter,
Taking all hints to use them-but swiftly leaping be-
yond them,

A reminiscence sing.

Once, Paumanok,

2.

When the snows had melted-when the lilac-scent was in the air, and the Fifth-month grass was growing,

Up this sea-shore, in some briars,

Two guests from Alabama-two together,

And their nest, and four light-green eggs, spotted with brown,

And every day the he-bird, to and fro, near at hand, And every day the she-bird, crouched on her nest, silent, with bright eyes;

And every day I, a curious boy, never too close, never disturbing them,

Cautiously peering, absorbing, translating.

"Shine! shine! shine!

3

Pour down your warmth, great Sun!

While we bask-we two together.

"Two together!

Winds blow South, or winds blow North,

Day come white, or night come black,