Leaves of Grass Part 35

To The States [To Identify the 16th, 17th, or 18th Presidentiad]

Why reclining, interrogating? why myself and all drowsing?

What deepening twilight-sc.u.m floating atop of the waters, Who are they as bats and night-dogs askant in the capitol?

What a filthy Presidentiad! (O South, your torrid suns! O North, your arctic freezings!) Are those really Congressmen? are those the great Judges? is that the President?

Then I will sleep awhile yet, for I see that these States sleep, for reasons; (With gathering murk, with muttering thunder and lambent shoots we all duly awake, South, North, East, West, inland and seaboard, we will surely awake.)

BOOK XXI. DRUM-TAPS

First O Songs for a Prelude First O songs for a prelude, Lightly strike on the stretch'd tympanum pride and joy in my city, How she led the rest to arms, how she gave the cue, How at once with lithe limbs unwaiting a moment she sprang, (O superb! O Manhattan, my own, my peerless!

O strongest you in the hour of danger, in crisis! O truer than steel!) How you sprang-how you threw off the costumes of peace with indifferent hand, How your soft opera-music changed, and the drum and fife were heard in their stead, How you led to the war, (that shall serve for our prelude, songs of soldiers,) How Manhattan drum-taps led.

Forty years had I in my city seen soldiers parading, Forty years as a pageant, till unawares the lady of this teeming and turbulent city, Sleepless amid her s.h.i.+ps, her houses, her incalculable wealth, With her million children around her, suddenly, At dead of night, at news from the south, Incens'd struck with clinch'd hand the pavement.

A shock electric, the night sustain'd it, Till with ominous hum our hive at daybreak pour'd out its myriads.

From the houses then and the workshops, and through all the doorways, Leapt they tumultuous, and lo! Manhattan arming.

To the drum-taps prompt, The young men falling in and arming, The mechanics arming, (the trowel, the jack-plane, the blacksmith's hammer, tost aside with precipitation,) The lawyer leaving his office and arming, the judge leaving the court, The driver deserting his wagon in the street, jumping down, throwing the reins abruptly down on the horses' backs, The salesman leaving the store, the boss, book-keeper, porter, all leaving; Squads gather everywhere by common consent and arm, The new recruits, even boys, the old men show them how to wear their accoutrements, they buckle the straps carefully, Outdoors arming, indoors arming, the flash of the musket-barrels, The white tents cl.u.s.ter in camps, the arm'd sentries around, the sunrise cannon and again at sunset, Arm'd regiments arrive every day, pa.s.s through the city, and embark from the wharves, (How good they look as they tramp down to the river, sweaty, with their guns on their shoulders!

How I love them! how I could hug them, with their brown faces and their clothes and knapsacks cover'd with dust!) The blood of the city up-arm'd! arm'd! the cry everywhere, The flags flung out from the steeples of churches and from all the public buildings and stores, The tearful parting, the mother kisses her son, the son kisses his mother, (Loth is the mother to part, yet not a word does she speak to detain him,) The tumultuous escort, the ranks of policemen preceding, clearing the way, The unpent enthusiasm, the wild cheers of the crowd for their favorites, The artillery, the silent cannons bright as gold, drawn along, rumble lightly over the stones, (Silent cannons, soon to cease your silence, Soon unlimber'd to begin the red business;) All the mutter of preparation, all the determin'd arming, The hospital service, the lint, bandages and medicines, The women volunteering for nurses, the work begun for in earnest, no mere parade now; War! an arm'd race is advancing! the welcome for battle, no turning away!

War! be it weeks, months, or years, an arm'd race is advancing to welcome it.

Mannahatta a-march-and it's O to sing it well!

It's O for a manly life in the camp.

And the st.u.r.dy artillery, The guns bright as gold, the work for giants, to serve well the guns, Unlimber them! (no more as the past forty years for salutes for courtesies merely, Put in something now besides powder and wadding.)

And you lady of s.h.i.+ps, you Mannahatta, Old matron of this proud, friendly, turbulent city, Often in peace and wealth you were pensive or covertly frown'd amid all your children, But now you smile with joy exulting old Mannahatta.

Eighteen Sixty-One

Arm'd year-year of the struggle, No dainty rhymes or sentimental love verses for you terrible year, Not you as some pale poetling seated at a desk lisping cadenzas piano, But as a strong man erect, clothed in blue clothes, advancing, carrying rifle on your shoulder, With well-gristled body and sunburnt face and hands, with a knife in the belt at your side, As I heard you shouting loud, your sonorous voice ringing across the continent, Your masculine voice O year, as rising amid the great cities, Amid the men of Manhattan I saw you as one of the workmen, the dwellers in Manhattan, Or with large steps crossing the prairies out of Illinois and Indiana, Rapidly crossing the West with springy gait and descending the Allghanies, Or down from the great lakes or in Pennsylvania, or on deck along the Ohio river, Or southward along the Tennessee or c.u.mberland rivers, or at Chattanooga on the mountain top, Saw I your gait and saw I your sinewy limbs clothed in blue, bearing weapons, robust year, Heard your determin'd voice launch'd forth again and again, Year that suddenly sang by the mouths of the round-lipp'd cannon, I repeat you, hurrying, cras.h.i.+ng, sad, distracted year.

Beat! Beat! Drums!

Beat! beat! drums!-blow! bugles! blow!

Through the windows-through doors-burst like a ruthless force, Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation, Into the school where the scholar is studying; Leave not the bridegroom quiet-no happiness must he have now with his bride, Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, ploughing his field or gathering his grain, So fierce you whirr and pound you drums-so shrill you bugles blow.

Beat! beat! drums!-blow! bugles! blow!

Over the traffic of cities-over the rumble of wheels in the streets; Are beds prepared for sleepers at night in the houses? no sleepers must sleep in those beds, No bargainers' bargains by day-no brokers or speculators-would they continue?

Would the talkers be talking? would the singer attempt to sing?

Would the lawyer rise in the court to state his case before the judge?

Then rattle quicker, heavier drums-you bugles wilder blow.

Beat! beat! drums!-blow! bugles! blow!

Make no parley-stop for no expostulation, Mind not the timid-mind not the weeper or prayer, Mind not the old man beseeching the young man, Let not the child's voice be heard, nor the mother's entreaties, Make even the trestles to shake the dead where they lie awaiting the hea.r.s.es, So strong you thump O terrible drums-so loud you bugles blow.

From Paumanok Starting I Fly Like a Bird

From Paumanok starting I fly like a bird, Around and around to soar to sing the idea of all, To the north betaking myself to sing there arctic songs, To Kanada till I absorb Kanada in myself, to Michigan then, To Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, to sing their songs, (they are inimitable;) Then to Ohio and Indiana to sing theirs, to Missouri and Kansas and Arkansas to sing theirs, To Tennessee and Kentucky, to the Carolinas and Georgia to sing theirs, To Texas and so along up toward California, to roam accepted everywhere; To sing first, (to the tap of the war-drum if need be,) The idea of all, of the Western world one and inseparable, And then the song of each member of these States.

Song of the Banner at Daybreak

Poet: O A new song, a free song, Flapping, flapping, flapping, flapping, by sounds, by voices clearer, By the wind's voice and that of the drum, By the banner's voice and child's voice and sea's voice and father's voice, Low on the ground and high in the air, On the ground where father and child stand, In the upward air where their eyes turn, Where the banner at daybreak is flapping.

Words! book-words! what are you?

Words no more, for hearken and see, My song is there in the open air, and I must sing, With the banner and pennant a-flapping.

I'll weave the chord and twine in, Man's desire and babe's desire, I'll twine them in, I'll put in life, I'll put the bayonet's flas.h.i.+ng point, I'll let bullets and slugs whizz, (As one carrying a symbol and menace far into the future, Crying with trumpet voice, Arouse and beware! Beware and arouse!) I'll pour the verse with streams of blood, full of volition, full of joy, Then loosen, launch forth, to go and compete, With the banner and pennant a-flapping.

Pennant: Come up here, bard, bard, Come up here, soul, soul, Come up here, dear little child, To fly in the clouds and winds with me, and play with the measureless light.

Child: Father what is that in the sky beckoning to me with long finger?

And what does it say to me all the while?

Father: Nothing my babe you see in the sky, And nothing at all to you it says-but look you my babe, Look at these dazzling things in the houses, and see you the money- shops opening, And see you the vehicles preparing to crawl along the streets with goods; These, ah these, how valued and toil'd for these!

How envied by all the earth.

Poet: Fresh and rosy red the sun is mounting high, On floats the sea in distant blue careering through its channels, On floats the wind over the breast of the sea setting in toward land, The great steady wind from west or west-by-south, Floating so buoyant with milk-white foam on the waters.

But I am not the sea nor the red sun, I am not the wind with girlish laughter, Not the immense wind which strengthens, not the wind which lashes, Not the spirit that ever lashes its own body to terror and death, But I am that which unseen comes and sings, sings, sings, Which babbles in brooks and scoots in showers on the land, Which the birds know in the woods mornings and evenings, And the sh.o.r.e-sands know and the hissing wave, and that banner and pennant, Aloft there flapping and flapping.

Child: O father it is alive-it is full of people-it has children, O now it seems to me it is talking to its children, I hear it-it talks to me-O it is wonderful!

O it stretches-it spreads and runs so fast-O my father, It is so broad it covers the whole sky.

Father: Cease, cease, my foolish babe, What you are saying is sorrowful to me, much 't displeases me; Behold with the rest again I say, behold not banners and pennants aloft, But the well-prepared pavements behold, and mark the solid-wall'd houses.

Banner and Pennant: Speak to the child O bard out of Manhattan, To our children all, or north or south of Manhattan, Point this day, leaving all the rest, to us over all-and yet we know not why, For what are we, mere strips of cloth profiting nothing, Only flapping in the wind?

Poet: I hear and see not strips of cloth alone, I hear the tramp of armies, I hear the challenging sentry, I hear the jubilant shouts of millions of men, I hear Liberty!

I hear the drums beat and the trumpets blowing, I myself move abroad swift-rising flying then, I use the wings of the land-bird and use the wings of the sea-bird, and look down as from a height, I do not deny the precious results of peace, I see populous cities with wealth incalculable, I see numberless farms, I see the farmers working in their fields or barns, I see mechanics working, I see buildings everywhere founded, going up, or finish'd, I see trains of cars swiftly speeding along railroad tracks drawn by the locomotives, I see the stores, depots, of Boston, Baltimore, Charleston, New Orleans, I see far in the West the immense area of grain, I dwell awhile hovering, I pa.s.s to the lumber forests of the North, and again to the Southern plantation, and again to California; Sweeping the whole I see the countless profit, the busy gatherings, earn'd wages, See the Ident.i.ty formed out of thirty-eight s.p.a.cious and haughty States, (and many more to come,) See forts on the sh.o.r.es of harbors, see s.h.i.+ps sailing in and out; Then over all, (aye! aye!) my little and lengthen'd pennant shaped like a sword, Runs swiftly up indicating war and defiance-and now the halyards have rais'd it, Side of my banner broad and blue, side of my starry banner, Discarding peace over all the sea and land.

Banner and Pennant: Yet louder, higher, stronger, bard! yet farther, wider cleave!