How
curious!
Whitman
Only toward as good as itself and toward the like of itself
will it advance half-way. An individual is as superb as a nation when he
has the qualities which make a superb nation. The soul of the largest and
wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of its
poets. The signs are effectual. There is no fear of mistake. If the one is
true, the other is true. The proof of a poet is that his country absorbs
him as affectionately as he has absorbed it.
[Script: Meantime, dear friend,
Farewell, Walt Whitman. ]
_CHANTS DEMOCRATIC. _
_STARTING FROM PAUMANOK. _
1.
Starting from fish-shape Paumanok,[1] where I was born,
Well-begotten, and raised by a perfect mother;
After roaming many lands--lover of populous pavements;
Dweller in Mannahatta,[2] city of ships, my city,--or on southern savannas;
Or a soldier camped, or carrying my knapsack and gun--or a miner in
California;
Or rude in my home in Dakotah's woods, my diet meat, my drink from the
spring;
Or withdrawn to muse and meditate in some deep recess,
Far from the clank of crowds, intervals passing, rapt and happy;
Aware of the fresh free giver, the flowing Missouri--aware of mighty
Niagara
Aware of the buffalo herds, grazing the plains--the hirsute and strong-
breasted bull;
Of earths, rocks, fifth-month flowers, experienced--stars, rain, snow, my
amaze;
Having studied the mocking-bird's tones, and the mountain hawk's,
And heard at dusk the unrivalled one, the hermit thrush, from the
swamp-cedars,
Solitary, singing in the West, I strike up for a New World.
2.
Victory, union, faith, identity, time,
Yourself, the present and future lands, the indissoluble compacts, riches,
mystery,
Eternal progress, the kosmos, and the modern reports.
This, then, is life;
Here is what has come to the surface after so many throes and convulsions.
How curious! how real!
Under foot the divine soil--over head the sun.
See, revolving, the globe;
The ancestor-continents, away, grouped together;
The present and future continents, north and south, with the isthmus
between.
See, vast trackless spaces;
As in a dream, they change, they swiftly fill;
Countless masses debouch upon them;
They are now covered with the foremost people, arts, institutions, known.
See, projected through time,
For me an audience interminable.
With firm and regular step they wend--they never stop,
Successions of men, Americanos, a hundred millions;
One generation playing its part, and passing on,
Another generation playing its part, and passing on in its turn,
With faces turned sideways or backward towards me, to listen,
With eyes retrospective towards me.
3.
Americanos! conquerors! marches humanitarian;
Foremost! century marches! Libertad! masses!
For you a programme of chants.
Chants of the prairies;
Chants of the long-running Mississippi, and down to the Mexican Sea;
Chants of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota;
Chants going forth from the centre, from Kansas, and thence, equidistant,
Shooting in pulses of fire, ceaseless, to vivify all.
will it advance half-way. An individual is as superb as a nation when he
has the qualities which make a superb nation. The soul of the largest and
wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of its
poets. The signs are effectual. There is no fear of mistake. If the one is
true, the other is true. The proof of a poet is that his country absorbs
him as affectionately as he has absorbed it.
[Script: Meantime, dear friend,
Farewell, Walt Whitman. ]
_CHANTS DEMOCRATIC. _
_STARTING FROM PAUMANOK. _
1.
Starting from fish-shape Paumanok,[1] where I was born,
Well-begotten, and raised by a perfect mother;
After roaming many lands--lover of populous pavements;
Dweller in Mannahatta,[2] city of ships, my city,--or on southern savannas;
Or a soldier camped, or carrying my knapsack and gun--or a miner in
California;
Or rude in my home in Dakotah's woods, my diet meat, my drink from the
spring;
Or withdrawn to muse and meditate in some deep recess,
Far from the clank of crowds, intervals passing, rapt and happy;
Aware of the fresh free giver, the flowing Missouri--aware of mighty
Niagara
Aware of the buffalo herds, grazing the plains--the hirsute and strong-
breasted bull;
Of earths, rocks, fifth-month flowers, experienced--stars, rain, snow, my
amaze;
Having studied the mocking-bird's tones, and the mountain hawk's,
And heard at dusk the unrivalled one, the hermit thrush, from the
swamp-cedars,
Solitary, singing in the West, I strike up for a New World.
2.
Victory, union, faith, identity, time,
Yourself, the present and future lands, the indissoluble compacts, riches,
mystery,
Eternal progress, the kosmos, and the modern reports.
This, then, is life;
Here is what has come to the surface after so many throes and convulsions.
How curious! how real!
Under foot the divine soil--over head the sun.
See, revolving, the globe;
The ancestor-continents, away, grouped together;
The present and future continents, north and south, with the isthmus
between.
See, vast trackless spaces;
As in a dream, they change, they swiftly fill;
Countless masses debouch upon them;
They are now covered with the foremost people, arts, institutions, known.
See, projected through time,
For me an audience interminable.
With firm and regular step they wend--they never stop,
Successions of men, Americanos, a hundred millions;
One generation playing its part, and passing on,
Another generation playing its part, and passing on in its turn,
With faces turned sideways or backward towards me, to listen,
With eyes retrospective towards me.
3.
Americanos! conquerors! marches humanitarian;
Foremost! century marches! Libertad! masses!
For you a programme of chants.
Chants of the prairies;
Chants of the long-running Mississippi, and down to the Mexican Sea;
Chants of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota;
Chants going forth from the centre, from Kansas, and thence, equidistant,
Shooting in pulses of fire, ceaseless, to vivify all.
