I TOO pass from the night,

I stay awhile away, O night, but I return to you again

1

and love you I

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 de

D

AREST thou now, O soul,

Walk out with me toward the unknown region, Where neither ground is for the feet nor any path to follow? DO

No map there, nor guide,

Nor voice sounding, nor touch of human hand,
Nor face with blooming flesh, nor lips, nor eyes, are in

Nor dost thou, all is a blank before us,

All waits undreamed of in that region, that inaccessible

land

Till when the ties loosen,

All but the ties eternal, Time and Space,

Nor darkness, gravitation, sense, nor any bounds bounding us

Then we burst forth, we float,

In Time and Space, O Soul, prepared for them
Equal, equipt at last, (O joy! O fruit of all!) them to fulfil,
O Soul! so

I

KNOW I am deathless,

I know this orbit of mine can not be swept by a carpenter's compass,

I know I shall not pass like a child's carlicue cut with a burnt stick at night

I know I am august,

I do not trouble my spirit to vindicate itself or be under

stood,

I see that the elementary laws never apologize (I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house by, after all) ›☛☛

I exist as I am, that is enough,

If no other in the world be aware I sit content

And if each and all be aware I sit content 00

One world is aware and by far the largest to me, and that

is myself,

And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years,

I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait.

My foothold is tenon'd and mortis'd in granite,

I laugh at what you call dissolution,

And I know the amplitude of time.

Whoever you

are! claim your own at any hazard!

O those who 've failed, in aspiration vast,

To unnam'd soldiers fallen in front on the lead,

To calm, devoted engineers-to over-ardent travelersto pilots on the ships,

To many a lofty song and picture without recognition -I'd rear a laurel-cover'd monument.

High, high above the rest-To all cut off before their time, Possess'd by some strange spirit of fire,

Quench'd by an early death.

GONIES are one of my changes of garments,

AG

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels,

I myself become the wounded person.

T

HE soul is always beautiful,

The universe is duly in order, everything is in its place,

What has arrived is in its place and what waits shall be

STRAN

in its place Do

TRANGER, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me?

And why should I not speak to you? se s

HE earth, that is sufficient,

I do not want the constellations any nearer,

I know they are very well where they are,

I know they suffice for those who belong to them ›☛ ›☛

Still here I carry my old delicious burdens,

I carry them, men and women, I carry them with me

wherever I go,

I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them,
I am fill'd with them, and I will fill them in return.

YOUTH,

OUTH, large, lusty, loving-youth full of grace, force, fascination,

Do you know that Old Age may come after you with equal grace, force, fascination?

Day full-blown and splendid-day of the immense sun, action, ambition, laughter,

The Night follows close with millions of suns, and sleep and restoring darkness.

HY, who makes much of a miracle?

W

As to me I know of nothing else but miracles,
Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan,

Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky, Or wade with naked feet along the beach just on the edge of the water,

Or stand under trees in the woods,

Or talk by day with any one I love, or sleep in the bed at night with any one I love,

Or sit at table at dinner with the rest,

Or look at strangers opposite me riding in the car,

Or watch honeybees busy around the hive of a Summer forenoon,

Or animals feeding in the field,

Or birds, or the wonderfulness of insects in the air,

Or the wonderfulness of the sundown, or the stars shining so quiet and bright,

Or the exquisite delicate thin curve of the new moon in

Spring;

These with the rest, one and all, are to me miracles, The whole referring, yet each distinct and in its place. To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle, Every cubic inch of space is a miracle,

Every square yard of the surface of the earth is spread with the same,

Every foot of the interior swarms with the same.
To me the sea is a continual miracle,

I

The fishes that swim-the rocks-the motions of the waves-the ships with men in them,

What stranger miracles are there? ››

POETS to come! orators, singers, musicians to come!

Not today is to justify me and answer what I am for, But you, a new brood, native, athletic, continental, greater than before known,

Arouse! for you must justify me o

I myself but write one or two indicative words for the

future,

I but advance a moment only to wheel and hurry back in the darkness.