Leaves of Grass Part 46

Then courage European revolter, revoltress!

For till all ceases neither must you cease.

I do not know what you are for, (I do not know what I am for myself, nor what any thing is for,) But I will search carefully for it even in being foil'd, In defeat, poverty, misconception, imprisonment-for they too are great.

Did we think victory great?

So it is-but now it seems to me, when it cannot be help'd, that defeat is great, And that death and dismay are great.

Unnamed Land

Nations ten thousand years before these States, and many times ten thousand years before these States, Garner'd cl.u.s.ters of ages that men and women like us grew up and travel'd their course and pa.s.s'd on, What vast-built cities, what orderly republics, what pastoral tribes and nomads, What histories, rulers, heroes, perhaps transcending all others, What laws, customs, wealth, arts, traditions, What sort of marriage, what costumes, what physiology and phrenology, What of liberty and slavery among them, what they thought of death and the soul, Who were witty and wise, who beautiful and poetic, who brutish and undevelop'd, Not a mark, not a record remains-and yet all remains.

O I know that those men and women were not for nothing, any more than we are for nothing, I know that they belong to the scheme of the world every bit as much as we now belong to it.

Afar they stand, yet near to me they stand, Some with oval countenances learn'd and calm, Some naked and savage, some like huge collections of insects, Some in tents, herdsmen, patriarchs, tribes, hors.e.m.e.n, Some prowling through woods, some living peaceably on farms, laboring, reaping, filling barns, Some traversing paved avenues, amid temples, palaces, factories, libraries, shows, courts, theatres, wonderful monuments.

Are those billions of men really gone?

Are those women of the old experience of the earth gone?

Do their lives, cities, arts, rest only with us?

Did they achieve nothing for good for themselves?

I believe of all those men and women that fill'd the unnamed lands, every one exists this hour here or elsewhere, invisible to us.

In exact proportion to what he or she grew from in life, and out of what he or she did, felt, became, loved, sinn'd, in life.

I believe that was not the end of those nations or any person of them, any more than this shall be the end of my nation, or of me; Of their languages, governments, marriage, literature, products, games, wars, manners, crimes, prisons, slaves, heroes, poets, I suspect their results curiously await in the yet unseen world, counterparts of what accrued to them in the seen world, I suspect I shall meet them there, I suspect I shall there find each old particular of those unnamed lands.

Song of Prudence

Manhattan's streets I saunter'd pondering, On Time, s.p.a.ce, Reality-on such as these, and abreast with them Prudence.

The last explanation always remains to be made about prudence, Little and large alike drop quietly aside from the prudence that suits immortality.

The soul is of itself, All verges to it, all has reference to what ensues, All that a person does, says, thinks, is of consequence, Not a move can a man or woman make, that affects him or her in a day, month, any part of the direct lifetime, or the hour of death, But the same affects him or her onward afterward through the indirect lifetime.

The indirect is just as much as the direct, The spirit receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body, if not more.

Not one word or deed, not venereal sore, discoloration, privacy of the onanist, Putridity of gluttons or rum-drinkers, peculation, cunning, betrayal, murder, seduction, prost.i.tution, But has results beyond death as really as before death.

Charity and personal force are the only investments worth any thing.

No specification is necessary, all that a male or female does, that is vigorous, benevolent, clean, is so much profit to him or her, In the unshakable order of the universe and through the whole scope of it forever.

Who has been wise receives interest, Savage, felon, President, judge, farmer, sailor, mechanic, literat, young, old, it is the same, The interest will come round-all will come round.

Singly, wholly, to affect now, affected their time, will forever affect, all of the past and all of the present and all of the future, All the brave actions of war and peace, All help given to relatives, strangers, the poor, old, sorrowful, young children, widows, the sick, and to shunn'd persons, All self-denial that stood steady and aloof on wrecks, and saw others fill the seats of the boats, All offering of substance or life for the good old cause, or for a friend's sake, or opinion's sake, All pains of enthusiasts scoff'd at by their neighbors, All the limitless sweet love and precious suffering of mothers, All honest men baffled in strifes recorded or unrecorded, All the grandeur and good of ancient nations whose fragments we inherit, All the good of the dozens of ancient nations unknown to us by name, date, location, All that was ever manfully begun, whether it succeeded or no, All suggestions of the divine mind of man or the divinity of his mouth, or the shaping of his great hands, All that is well thought or said this day on any part of the globe, or on any of the wandering stars, or on any of the fix'd stars, by those there as we are here, All that is henceforth to be thought or done by you whoever you are, or by any one, These inure, have inured, shall inure, to the ident.i.ties from which they sprang, or shall spring.

Did you guess any thing lived only its moment?

The world does not so exist, no parts palpable or impalpable so exist, No consummation exists without being from some long previous consummation, and that from some other, Without the farthest conceivable one coming a bit nearer the beginning than any.

Whatever satisfies souls is true; Prudence entirely satisfies the craving and glut of souls, Itself only finally satisfies the soul, The soul has that measureless pride which revolts from every lesson but its own.

Now I breathe the word of the prudence that walks abreast with time, s.p.a.ce, reality, That answers the pride which refuses every lesson but its own.

What is prudence is indivisible, Declines to separate one part of life from every part, Divides not the righteous from the unrighteous or the living from the dead, Matches every thought or act by its correlative, Knows no possible forgiveness or deputed atonement, Knows that the young man who composedly peril'd his life and lost it has done exceedingly well for himself without doubt, That he who never peril'd his life, but retains it to old age in riches and ease, has probably achiev'd nothing for himself worth mentioning, Knows that only that person has really learn'd who has learn'd to prefer results, Who favors body and soul the same, Who perceives the indirect a.s.suredly following the direct, Who in his spirit in any emergency whatever neither hurries nor avoids death.

The Singer in the Prison

O sight of pity, shame and dole!

O fearful thought-a convict soul.

1 Rang the refrain along the hall, the prison, Rose to the roof, the vaults of heaven above, Pouring in floods of melody in tones so pensive sweet and strong the like whereof was never heard, Reaching the far-off sentry and the armed guards, who ceas'd their pacing, Making the hearer's pulses stop for ecstasy and awe.

2 The sun was low in the west one winter day, When down a narrow aisle amid the thieves and outlaws of the land, (There by the hundreds seated, sear-faced murderers, wily counterfeiters, Gather'd to Sunday church in prison walls, the keepers round, Plenteous, well-armed, watching with vigilant eyes,) Calmly a lady walk'd holding a little innocent child by either hand, Whom seating on their stools beside her on the platform, She, first preluding with the instrument a low and musical prelude, In voice surpa.s.sing all, sang forth a quaint old hymn.

A soul confined by bars and bands, Cries, help! O help! and wrings her hands, Blinded her eyes, bleeding her breast, Nor pardon finds, nor balm of rest.

Ceaseless she paces to and fro, O heart-sick days! O nights of woe!

Nor hand of friend, nor loving face, Nor favor comes, nor word of grace.

It was not I that sinn'd the sin, The ruthless body dragg'd me in; Though long I strove courageously, The body was too much for me.

Dear prison'd soul bear up a s.p.a.ce, For soon or late the certain grace; To set thee free and bear thee home, The heavenly pardoner death shall come.

Convict no more, nor shame, nor dole!

Depart-a G.o.d-enfranchis'd soul!

3 The singer ceas'd, One glance swept from her clear calm eyes o'er all those upturn'd faces, Strange sea of prison faces, a thousand varied, crafty, brutal, seam'd and beauteous faces, Then rising, pa.s.sing back along the narrow aisle between them, While her gown touch'd them rustling in the silence, She vanish'd with her children in the dusk.

While upon all, convicts and armed keepers ere they stirr'd, (Convict forgetting prison, keeper his loaded pistol,) A hush and pause fell down a wondrous minute, With deep half-stifled sobs and sound of bad men bow'd and moved to weeping, And youth's convulsive breathings, memories of home, The mother's voice in lullaby, the sister's care, the happy childhood, The long-pent spirit rous'd to reminiscence; A wondrous minute then-but after in the solitary night, to many, many there, Years after, even in the hour of death, the sad refrain, the tune, the voice, the words, Resumed, the large calm lady walks the narrow aisle, The wailing melody again, the singer in the prison sings,

O sight of pity, shame and dole!

O fearful thought-a convict soul.

Warble for Lilac-Time

Warble me now for joy of lilac-time, (returning in reminiscence,) Sort me O tongue and lips for Nature's sake, souvenirs of earliest summer, Gather the welcome signs, (as children with pebbles or stringing sh.e.l.ls,) Put in April and May, the hylas croaking in the ponds, the elastic air, Bees, b.u.t.terflies, the sparrow with its simple notes, Blue-bird and darting swallow, nor forget the high-hole flashing his golden wings, The tranquil sunny haze, the clinging smoke, the vapor, Shimmer of waters with fish in them, the cerulean above, All that is jocund and sparkling, the brooks running, The maple woods, the crisp February days and the sugar-making, The robin where he hops, bright-eyed, brown-breasted, With musical clear call at sunrise, and again at sunset, Or flitting among the trees of the apple-orchard, building the nest of his mate, The melted snow of March, the willow sending forth its yellow-green sprouts, For spring-time is here! the summer is here! and what is this in it and from it?

Thou, soul, unloosen'd-the restlessness after I know not what; Come, let us lag here no longer, let us be up and away!

O if one could but fly like a bird!