Poems By Walt Whitman Part 36

Aloof, dissatisfied, plotting revolt, Comrade of criminals, brother of slaves, Crafty, despised, a drudge, ignorant, With sudra face and worn brow--black, but in the depths of my heart proud as any; Lifted, now and always, against whoever, scorning, a.s.sumes to rule me; Morose, full of guile, full of reminiscences, brooding, with many wiles, Though it was thought I was baffled and dispelled, and my wiles done--but that will never be; Defiant I SATAN still live--still utter words--in new lands duly appearing, and old ones also; Permanent here, from my side, warlike, equal with any, real as any, Nor time, nor change, shall ever change me or my words.

THE SPIRIT.

Santa SPIRITA,[1] breather, life, Beyond the light, lighter than light, Beyond the flames of h.e.l.l--joyous, leaping easily above h.e.l.l; Beyond Paradise--perfumed solely with mine own perfume; Including all life on earth--touching, including G.o.d--including Saviour and Satan; Ethereal, pervading all--for, without me, what were all? what were G.o.d?

Essence of forms--life of the real ident.i.ties, permanent, positive, namely the unseen, Life of the great round world, the sun and stars, and of man--I, the General Soul, Here the Square finishing, the solid, I the most solid, Breathe my breath also through these little songs.

[Footnote 1: The reader will share my wish that Whitman had written _sanctus spiritus_, which is right, instead of _santa spirita_, which is methodically wrong.]

_SONGS OF PARTING._

_SINGERS AND POETS._

1.

The indications and tally of time; Perfect sanity shows the master among philosophs; Time, always without flaw, indicates itself in parts; What always indicates the poet is the crowd of the pleasant company of singers, and their words; The words of the singers are the hours or minutes of the light or dark--but the words of the maker of poems are the general light and dark; The maker of poems settles justice, reality, immortality, His insight and power encircle things and the human race, He is the glory and extract, thus far, of things and of the human race.

2.

The singers do not beget--only the POET begets; The singers are welcomed, understood, appear often enough--but rare has the day been, likewise the spot, of the birth of the maker of poems; Not every century, or every five centuries, has contained such a day, for all its names.

The singers of successive hours of centuries may have ostensible names, but the name of each of them is one of the singers; The name of each is eye-singer, ear-singer, head-singer, sweet-singer, echo-singer, parlour-singer, love-singer, or something else.

3.

All this time, and at all times, wait the words of poems; The greatness of sons is the exuding of the greatness of mothers and fathers; The words of poems are the tuft and final applause of science.

Divine instinct, breadth of vision, the law of reason, health, rudeness of body, withdrawnness, gaiety, sun-tan, air-sweetness--such are some of the words of poems.

4.

The sailor and traveller underlie the maker of poems, The builder, geometer, chemist, anatomist, phrenologist, artist--all these underlie the maker of poems.

5.

The words of the true poems give you more than poems, They give you, to form for yourself, poems, religions, politics, war, peace, behaviour, histories, essays, romances, and everything else, They balance ranks, colours, races, creeds, and the s.e.xes, They do not seek beauty--they are sought, For ever touching them, or close upon them, follows beauty, longing, fain, love-sick.

They prepare for death--yet are they not the finish, but rather the outset, They bring none to his or her terminus, or to be content and full; Whom they take, they take into s.p.a.ce, to behold the birth of stars, to learn one of the meanings, To launch off with absolute faith--to sweep through the ceaseless rings, and never be quiet again.

_TO A HISTORIAN._

You who celebrate bygones: Who have explored the outward, the surfaces of the races--the life that has exhibited itself; Who have treated of man as the creature of politics, aggregates, rulers, and priests.

I, habitue of the Alleghanies, treating man as he is in himself, in his own rights, Pressing the pulse of the life that has seldom exhibited itself, the great pride of man in himself; Chanter of Personality, outlining what is yet to be; I project the history of the future.

_FIT AUDIENCE._

1.

Whoever you are, holding me now in hand, Without one thing, all will be useless: I give you fair warning, before you attempt me further, I am not what you supposed, but far different.

2.

Who is he that would become my follower?

Who would sign himself a candidate for my affections?

The way is suspicious--the result uncertain, perhaps destructive; You would have to give up all else--I alone would expect to be your G.o.d, sole and exclusive; Your novitiate would even then be long and exhausting, The whole past theory of your life, and all conformity to the lives around you, would have to be abandoned; Therefore release me now, before troubling yourself any further--Let go your hand from my shoulders, Put me down, and depart on your way.

Or else, by stealth, in some wood, for trial, Or back of a rock, in the open air, (For in any roofed room of a house I emerge not--nor in company, And in libraries I lie as one dumb, a gawk, or unborn, or dead,) But just possibly with you on a high hill--first watching lest any person, for miles around, approach unawares-- Or possibly with you sailing at sea, or on the beach of the sea, or some quiet island, Here to put your lips upon mine I permit you, With the comrade's long-dwelling kiss, or the new husband's kiss, For I am the new husband, and I am the comrade.

Or, if you will, thrusting me beneath your clothing, Where I may feel the throbs of your heart, or rest upon your hip, Carry me when you go forth over land or sea; For thus, merely touching you, is enough--is best, And thus, touching you, would I silently sleep, and be carried eternally.

3.

But these leaves conning, you con at peril, For these leaves, and me, you will not understand, They will elude you at first, and still more afterward--I will certainly elude you, Even while you should think you had unquestionably caught me, behold!

Already you see I have escaped from you.

For it is not for what I have put into it that I have written this book, Nor is it by reading it you will acquire it, Nor do those know me best who admire me, and vauntingly praise me, Nor will the candidates for my love (unless at most a very few) prove victorious, Nor will my poems do good only--they will do just as much evil, perhaps more; For all is useless without that which you may guess at many times and not hit--that which I hinted at; Therefore release me, and depart on your way.

_SINGING IN SPRING._

These I, singing in spring, collect for lovers: For who but I should understand lovers, and all their sorrow and joy?

And who but I should be the poet of comrades?

Collecting, I traverse the garden, the world--but soon I pa.s.s the gates, Now along the pond-side--now wading in a little, fearing not the wet, Now by the post-and-rail fences, where the old stones thrown there, picked from the fields, have acc.u.mulated, Wild flowers and vines and weeds come up through the stones, and partly cover them--Beyond these I pa.s.s, Far, far in the forest, before I think where I go, Solitary, smelling the earthy smell, stopping now and then in the silence; Alone, I had thought--yet soon a silent troop gathers around me; Some walk by my side, and some behind, and some embrace my arms or neck, They, the spirits of friends, dead or alive--thicker they come, a great crowd, and I in the middle, Collecting, dispensing, singing in spring, there I wander with them, Plucking something for tokens--tossing toward whoever is near me.

Here lilac, with a branch of pine, Here, out of my pocket, some moss which I pulled off a live-oak in Florida, as it hung trailing down, Here some pinks and laurel leaves, and a handful of sage, And here what I now draw from the water, wading in the pond-side, (O here I last saw him that tenderly loves me--and returns again, never to separate from me, And this, O this shall henceforth be the token of comrades--this Calamus- root[1] shall, Interchange it, youths, with each other! Let none render it back!) And twigs of maple, and a bunch of wild orange, and chestnut, And stems of currants, and plum-blows, and the aromatic cedar, These I, compa.s.sed around by a thick cloud of spirits, Wandering, point to, or touch as I pa.s.s, or throw them loosely from me, Indicating to each one what he shall have--giving something to each.

But what I drew from the water by the pond-side, that I reserve; I will give of it--but only to them that love as I myself am capable of loving.

[Footnote 1: I am favoured with the following indication, from Mr Whitman himself, of the relation in which this word Calamus is to be understood:--"Calamus is the very large and aromatic gra.s.s or rush growing about water-ponds in the valleys--spears about three feet high; often called Sweet Flag; grows all over the Northern and Middle States. The _recherche_ or ethereal sense of the term, as used in my book, arises probably from the actual Calamus presenting the biggest and hardiest kind of spears of gra.s.s, and their fresh, aquatic, pungent _bouquet_."]