He whom I call answers me and takes the place of my lover, He rises with me silently from the bed.
Darkness, you are gentler than my lover, his flesh was sweaty and panting, I feel the hot moisture yet that he left me.
My hands are spread forth, I pa.s.s them in all directions, I would sound up the shadowy sh.o.r.e to which you are journeying.
Be careful darkness! already what was it touch"d me?
I thought my lover had gone, else darkness and he are one, I hear the heart-beat, I follow, I fade away.
2 I descend my western course, my sinews are flaccid, Perfume and youth course through me and I am their wake.
It is my face yellow and wrinkled instead of the old woman"s, I sit low in a straw-bottom chair and carefully darn my grandson"s stockings.
It is I too, the sleepless widow looking out on the winter midnight, I see the sparkles of starshine on the icy and pallid earth.
A shroud I see and I am the shroud, I wrap a body and lie in the coffin, It is dark here under ground, it is not evil or pain here, it is blank here, for reasons.
(It seems to me that every thing in the light and air ought to be happy, Whoever is not in his coffin and the dark grave let him know he has enough.)
3 I see a beautiful gigantic swimmer swimming naked through the eddies of the sea, His brown hair lies close and even to his head, he strikes out with courageous arms, he urges himself with his legs, I see his white body, I see his undaunted eyes, I hate the swift-running eddies that would dash him head-foremost on the rocks.
What are you doing you ruffianly red-trickled waves?
Will you kill the courageous giant? will you kill him in the prime of his middle age?
Steady and long he struggles, He is baffled, bang"d, bruis"d, he holds out while his strength holds out, The slapping eddies are spotted with his blood, they bear him away, they roll him, swing him, turn him, His beautiful body is borne in the circling eddies, it is continually bruis"d on rocks, Swiftly and ought of sight is borne the brave corpse.
4 I turn but do not extricate myself, Confused, a past-reading, another, but with darkness yet.
The beach is cut by the razory ice-wind, the wreck-guns sound, The tempest lulls, the moon comes floundering through the drifts.
I look where the ship helplessly heads end on, I hear the burst as she strikes, I hear the howls of dismay, they grow fainter and fainter.
I cannot aid with my wringing fingers, I can but rush to the surf and let it drench me and freeze upon me.
I search with the crowd, not one of the company is wash"d to us alive, In the morning I help pick up the dead and lay them in rows in a barn.
5 Now of the older war-days, the defeat at Brooklyn, Washington stands inside the lines, he stands on the intrench"d hills amid a crowd of officers.
His face is cold and damp, he cannot repress the weeping drops, He lifts the gla.s.s perpetually to his eyes, the color is blanch"d from his cheeks, He sees the slaughter of the southern braves confided to him by their parents.
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 pa.s.s 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.
6 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, coa.r.s.e, 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.
7 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 ennuye, 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.
8 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 l.u.s.t, 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 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 pa.s.sages open, the paralyzed become supple, The swell"d and convuls"d and congested awake to themselves in condition, They pa.s.s the invigoration of the night and the chemistry of the night, and awake.
I too pa.s.s 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 pa.s.s the day O my mother, and duly return to you.
Transpositions
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.
BOOK XXIX
To Think of Time 1 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.
2 Not a day pa.s.ses, not a minute or second without an accouchement, Not a day pa.s.ses, 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.