Leaves of Grass First and Death-Bed Editions (69 page)

 

The same at last and at last when peace is declared,
He stands in the room of the old tavern, the well-belov’d soldiers
all pass through,
The officers speechless and slow draw near in their turns,
The chief encircles their necks with his arm and kisses them on
the cheek,
He kisses lightly the wet cheeks one after another, he shakes
hands and bids good-by to the army.

Now what my mother told me one day as we sat at dinner
together,
Of when she was a nearly grown girl living home with her parents
on the old homestead.

 

A red squaw came one breakfast-time to the old homestead,
On her back she carried a bundle of rushes for rush-bottoming
chairs,
Her hair, straight, shiny, coarse, black, profuse, half-envelop’d her
face,
Her step was free and elastic, and her voice sounded exquisitely as
she spoke.

 

My mother look’d in delight and amazement at the
stranger,
She look’d at the freshness of her tall-borne face and full and
pliant limbs,
The more she look’d upon her she loved her,
Never before had she seen such wonderful beauty and purity,
She made her sit on a bench by the jamb of the fireplace, she
cook’d food for her,
She had no work to give her, but she gave her remembrance and
fondness.

 

The red squaw staid all the forenoon, and toward the middle of
the afternoon she went away,
O my mother was loth to have her go away,
All the week she thought of her, she watch’d for her many a
month,
She remember’d her many a winter and many a summer,
But the red squaw never came nor was heard of there
again.

A show of the summer softness—a contact of something
unseen—an amour of the light and air,
I am jealous and overwhelm’d with friendliness,
And will go gallivant with the light and air myself.

 

O love and summer, you are in the dreams and in me,
Autumn and winter are in the dreams, the farmer goes with his
thrift,
The droves and crops increase, the barns are well-fill’d.

 

Elements merge in the night, ships make tacks in the dreams,
The sailor sails, the exile returns home,
The fugitive returns unharm‘d, the immigrant is back beyond
months and years,
The poor Irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood
with the well-known neighbors and faces,
They warmly welcome him, he is barefoot again, he forgets he is
well off,
The Dutchman voyages home, and the Scotchman and
Welshman voyage home, and the native of the Mediterranean
voyages home,
To every port of England, France, Spain, enter well-fill’d ships,
The Swiss foots it toward his hills, the Prussian goes his way, the
Hungarian his way, and the Pole his way,
The Swede returns, and the Dane and Norwegian return.

 

The homeward bound and the outward bound,
The beautiful lost swimmer, the ennuyé, the onanist, the female
that loves unrequited, the money-maker,
The actor and actress, those through with their parts and those
waiting to commence,
The affectionate boy, the husband and wife, the voter, the
nominee that is chosen and the nominee that has fail‘d,
The great already known and the great any time after to-day,
The stammerer, the sick, the perfect-form’d, the homely,
The criminal that stood in the box, the judge that sat and
sentenced him, the fluent lawyers, the jury, the audience,
The laugher and weeper, the dancer, the midnight widow, the red
squaw,
The consumptive, the erysipalite, the idiot, he that is wrong‘d,
The antipodes, and every one between this and them in the
dark,
I swear they are averaged now—one is no better than the other,
The night and sleep have liken’d them and restored them.

 

I swear they are all beautiful,
Every one that sleeps is beautiful, every thing in the dim light is
beautiful,
The wildest and bloodiest is over, and all is peace.

Peace is always beautiful,
The myth of heaven indicates peace and night.

 

The myth of heaven indicates the soul,
The soul is always beautiful, it appears more or it appears less, it
comes or it lags behind,
It comes from its embower’d garden and looks pleasantly on itself
and encloses the world,
Perfect and clean the genitals previously jetting, and perfect and
clean the womb cohering,
The head well-grown proportion’d and plumb, and the bowels
and joints proportion’d and plumb.

 

The soul is always beautiful,
The universe is duly in order, every thing is in its place,
What has arrived is in its place and what waits shall be in its
place,
The twisted skull waits, the watery or rotten blood waits,
The child of the glutton or venerealee waits long, and the child
of the drunkard waits long, and the drunkard himself waits
long,
The sleepers that lived and died wait, the far advanced are to go
on in their turns, and the far behind are to come on in their
turns,
The diverse shall be no less diverse, but they shall flow and
unite—they unite now.

The sleepers are very beautiful as they lie unclothed,
They flow hand in hand over the whole earth from east to west as
they lie unclothed,
The Asiatic and African are hand in hand, the European and
American are hand in hand,
Learn’d and unlearn’d are hand in hand, and male and female
are hand in hand,
The bare arm of the girl crosses the bare breast of her lover, they
press close without lust, his lips press her neck,
The father holds his grown or ungrown son in his arms with
measureless love, and the son holds the father in his arms
with measureless love,
The white hair of the mother shines on the white wrist of the
daughter,
The breath of the boy goes with the breath of the man, friend is
inarm’d by friend,
The scholar kisses the teacher and the teacher kisses the scholar,
the wrong’d is made right,
The call of the slave is one with the master’s call, and the master
salutes the slave,
The felon steps forth from the prison, the insane becomes sane,
the suffering of sick persons is reliev‘d,
The sweatings and fevers stop, the throat that was unsound is
sound, the lungs of the consumptive are resumed, the poor
distress’d head is free,
The joints of the rheumatic move as smoothly as ever, and
smoother than ever,
Stiflings and passages open, the paralyzed become supple,
The swell’d and convuls’d and congested awake to themselves in
condition,
They pass the invigoration of the night and the chemistry of the
night, and awake.

 

I too pass from the night,
I stay a while away O night, but I return to you again and
love you.

 

Why should I be afraid to trust myself to you?
I am not afraid, I have been well brought forward by you,
I love the rich running day, but I do not desert her in whom I lay
so long,
I know not how I came of you and I know not where I go with
you, but I know I came well and shall go well.

 

I will stop only a time with the night, and rise betimes,
I will duly pass the day O my mother, and duly return
to you.

Let the reformers descend from the stands where they are forever
bawling—let an idiot or insane person appear on each of the
stands;
Let judges and criminals be transposed—let the prison-keepers be
put in prison—let those that were prisoners take the keys;
Let them that distrust birth and death lead the rest.

To think of time—of all that retrospection,
To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward.

 

Have you guess’d you yourself would not continue?
Have you dreaded these earth-beetles?
Have you fear’d the future would be nothing to you?

 

Is to-day nothing? is the beginningless past nothing?
If the future is nothing they are just as surely nothing.

To think that the sun rose in the east—that men and women were
flexible, real, alive—that every thing was alive,
To think that you and I did not see, feel, think, nor bear
our part,
To think that we are now here and bear our part.

Not a day passes, not a minute or second without an
accouchement,
Not a day passes, not a minute or second without a corpse.

The dull nights go over and the dull days also,
The soreness of lying so much in bed goes over,
The physician after long putting off gives the silent and terrible
look for an answer,
The children come hurried and weeping, and the brothers and
sisters are sent for,
Medicines stand unused on the shelf, (the camphor-smell has
long pervaded the rooms,)
The faithful hand of the living does not desert the hand of the
dying,
The twitching lips press lightly on the forehead of the dying,
The breath ceases and the pulse of the heart ceases,
The corpse stretches on the bed and the living look upon it,
It is palpable as the living are palpable.

 

The living look upon the corpse with their eyesight,
But without eyesight lingers a different living and looks curiously
on the corpse.

To think the thought of death merged in the thought of
materials,
To think of all these wonders of city and country, and others
taking great interest in them, and we taking no interest in
them.

 

To think how eager we are in building our houses,
To think others shall be just as eager, and we quite indifferent.

 

(I see one building the house that serves him a few years, or
seventy or eighty years at most,
I see one building the house that serves him longer than
that.)

 

Slow-moving and black lines creep over the whole earth—they
never cease—they are the burial lines,
He that was President was buried, and he that is now President
shall surely be buried.

A reminiscence of the vulgar fate,
A frequent sample of the life and death of workmen,
Each after his kind.

 

Cold dash of waves at the ferry-wharf, posh and ice in the river,
half-frozen mud in the streets,
A gray discouraged sky overhead, the short last daylight of
December,
A hearse and stages, the funeral of an old Broadway stage-driver,
the cortege mostly drivers.

 

Steady the trot to the cemetery, duly rattles the death-bell,
The gate is pass‘d, the new-dug grave is halted at, the living alight,
the hearse uncloses,
The coffin is pass’d out, lower’d and settled, the whip is laid on
the coffin, the earth is swiftly shovel’d in,
The mound above is flatted with the spades—silence,
A minute—no one moves or speaks—it is done,
He is decently put away—is there any thing more?

 

He was a good fellow, free-mouth‘d, quick-temper’d, not bad
looking,
Ready with life or death for a friend, fond of women, gambled,
ate hearty, drank hearty,
Had known what it was to be flush, grew low-spirited toward the
last, sicken‘d, was help’d by a contribution,
Died, aged forty-one years—and that was his funeral.

 

Thumb extended, finger uplifted, apron, cape, gloves, strap, wet
weather clothes, whip carefully chosen,
Boss, spotter, starter, hostler, somebody loafing on you, you
loafing on somebody, headway, man before and man
behind,
Good day’s work, bad day’s work, pet stock, mean stock, first out,
last out, turning-in at night,
To think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers, and
he there takes no interest in them.

The markets, the government, the working-man’s wages, to think
what account they are through our nights and days,
To think that other working-men will make just as great account
of them, yet we make little or no account.

 

The vulgar and the refined, what you call sin and what you call
goodness, to think how wide a difference,
To think the difference will still continue to others, yet we lie
beyond the difference.

 

To think how much pleasure there is,
Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in business? or
planning a nomination and election? or with your wife and
family?
Or with your mother and sisters? or in womanly housework? or
the beautiful maternal cares?
These also flow onward to others, you and I flow onward,
But in due time you and I shall take less interest in them.

 

Your farm, profits, crops—to think how engross’d you are,
To think there will still be farms, profits, crops, yet for you of what
avail?

What will be will be well, for what is is well,
To take interest is well, and not to take interest shall be well.

 

The domestic joys, the daily housework or business, the building
of houses are not phantasms, they have weight, form, location,
Farms, profits, crops, markets, wages, government, are none of
them phantasms,
The difference between sin and goodness is no delusion,
The earth is not an echo, man and his life and all the things of
his life are well-consider’d.

 

 

You are not thrown to the winds, you gather certainly and safely
around yourself,
Yourself! yourself! yourself, for ever and ever!

It is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and
father, it is to identify you,
It is not that you should be undecided, but that you should be
decided,
Something long preparing and formless is arrived and form’d in
you,
You are henceforth secure, whatever comes or goes.

 

The threads that were spun are gather‘d, the weft crosses the warp, the pattern is systematic.

 

The preparations have every one been justified,
The orchestra have sufficiently tuned their instruments, the baton
has given the signal.