Անգլո-ամերիկյան գրականության նմուշներ` բնագրով

[Philosopher]

33
O swift wind! O space and time! now I see it is true, what I guessed at;
What I guess'd when I loaf'd on the grass;
What I guess'd while I lay alone in my bed,
And again as I walk'd the beach under the paling stars of the morning.
My ties and ballasts leave me--I travel--I sail--my elbows rest in the sea-gaps;
I skirt the sierras--my palms cover continents;
I am afoot with my vision.
By the city's quadrangular houses--in log huts--camping with lumbermen;
Along the ruts of the turnpike--along the dry gulch and rivulet bed;
Weeding my onion-patch, or hoeing rows of carrots and parsnips-- crossing
savannas--trailing in forests;
Prospecting--gold-digging--girdling the trees of a new purchase;
Scorch'd ankle-deep by the hot sand--hauling my boat down the shallow river;
Where the panther walks to and fro on a limb overhead--where the buck turns furiously
at the hunter;
Where the rattlesnake suns his flabby length on a rock--where the otter is feeding on
fish;
Where the alligator in his tough pimples sleeps by the bayou;
Where the black bear is searching for roots or honey--where the beaver pats the mud
with his paddle-shaped tail;
Over the growing sugar--over the yellow-flower'd cotton plant--over the rice in its low
moist field;
Over the sharp-peak'd farm house, with its scallop'd scum and slender shoots from the
gutters;
Over the western persimmon--over the long-leav'd corn--over the delicate blue-flower
flax;
Over the white and brown buckwheat, a hummer and buzzer there with the rest;
Over the dusky green of the rye as it ripples and shades in the breeze;
Scaling mountains, pulling myself cautiously up, holding on by low scragged limbs;
Walking the path worn in the grass, and beat through the leaves of the brush;
Where the quail is whistling betwixt the woods and the wheat-lot;
Where the bat flies in the Seventh-month eve--where the great gold- bug drops
through the dark;
Where flails keep time on the barn floor;
Where the brook puts out of the roots of the old tree and flows to the meadow;
Where cattle stand and shake away flies with the tremulous shuddering of their hides;
Where the cheese-cloth hangs in the kitchen--where andirons straddle the
hearth-slab--where cobwebs fall in festoons from the rafters;
Where trip-hammers crash--where the press is whirling its cylinders;
Wherever the human heart beats with terrible throes under its ribs;
Where the pear-shaped balloon is floating aloft, (floating in it myself, and looking
composedly down)
Where the life-car is drawn on the slip-noose--where the heat hatches pale-green eggs
in the dented sand;
Where the she-whale swims with her calf, and never forsakes it;
Where the steam-ship trails hind-ways its long pennant of smoke;
Where the fin of the shark cuts like a black chip out of the water;
Where the half-burn'd brig is riding on unknown currents,
Where shells grow to her slimy deck--where the dead are corrupting below;
Where the dense-starr'd flag is borne at the head of the regiments;
Approaching Manhattan, up by the long-stretching island;
Under Niagara, the cataract falling like a veil over my countenance;
Upon a door-step--upon the horse-block of hard wood outside;
Upon the race-course, or enjoying picnics or jigs, or a good game of base-ball;
At he-festivals, with blackguard jibes, ironical license, bull- dances, drinking, laughter;
At the cider-mill, tasting the sweets of the brown mash, sucking the juice through a
straw;
At apple-peelings, wanting kisses for all the red fruit I find;
At musters, beach-parties, friendly bees, huskings, house-raisings:
Where the mocking-bird sounds his delicious gurgles, cackles, screams, weeps;
Where the hay-rick stands in the barn-yard--where the dry-stalks are scattered--where
the brood-cow waits in the hovel;
Where the bull advances to do his masculine work--where the stud to the mare--where
the cock is treading the hen;
Where the heifers browse--where geese nip their food with short jerks;
Where sun-down shadows lengthen over the limitless and lonesome prairie;
Where herds of buffalo make a crawling spread of the square miles far and near;
Where the humming-bird shimmers--where the neck of the long-lived swan is curving
and winding;
Where the laughing-gull scoots by the shore, where she laughs her near-human laugh;
Where bee-hives range on a gray bench in the garden, half hid by the high weeds;
Where band-neck'd partridges roost in a ring on the ground with their heads out;
Where burial coaches enter the arch'd gates of a cemetery;
Where winter wolves bark amid wastes of snow and icicled trees;
Where the yellow-crown'd heron comes to the edge of the marsh at night and feeds
upon small crabs;
Where the splash of swimmers and divers cools the warm noon;
Where the katy-did works her chromatic reed on the walnut-tree over the well;
Through patches of citrons and cucumbers with silver-wired leaves;
Through the salt-lick or orange glade, or under conical firs; Through the
gymnasium--through the curtain'd saloon--through the office or public hall;
Pleas'd with the native, and pleas'd with the foreign--pleas'd with the new and old;
Pleas'd with women, the homely as well as the handsome;
Pleas'd with the quakeress as she puts off her bonnet and talks melodiously;
Pleas'd with the tune of the choir of the white-wash'd church;
Pleas'd with the earnest words of the sweating Methodist preacher, or any
preacher--impress'd seriously at the camp-meeting:
Looking in at the shop-windows of Broadway the whole forenoon-- flatting the flesh of
my nose on the thick plate-glass;
Wandering the same afternoon with my face turn'd up to the clouds,
My right and left arms round the sides of two friends, and I in the middle:
Coming home with the silent and dark-cheek'd bush-boy--(behind me he rides at the
drape of the day)
Far from the settlements, studying the print of animals' feet, or the moccasin print;
By the cot in the hospital, reaching lemonade to a feverish patient;
Nigh the coffin'd corpse when all is still, examining with a candle:
Voyaging to every port, to dicker and adventure;
Hurrying with the modern crowd, as eager and fickle as any;
Hot toward one I hate, ready in my madness to knife him;
Solitary at midnight in my back yard, my thoughts gone from me a long while;
Walking the old hills of Judea, with the beautiful gentle God by my side;
Speeding through space--speeding through heaven and the stars;
Speeding amid the seven satellites, and the broad ring, and the diameter of eighty
thousand miles;
Speeding with tail'd meteors--throwing fire-balls like the rest;
Carrying the crescent child that carries its own full mother in its belly;
Storming, enjoying, planning, loving, cautioning,
Backing and filling, appearing and disappearing;
I tread day and night such roads.
And look at quintillions ripen'd, and look at quintillions green.
I fly the flight of the fluid and swallowing soul;
My course runs below the soundings of plummets.
I help myself to material and immaterial;
No guard can shut me off, nor law prevent me.
I anchor my ship for a little while only;
My messengers continually cruise away, or bring their returns to me.
I go hunting polar furs and the seal--leaping chasms with a pike- pointed staff--clinging
to topples of brittle and blue.
I ascend to the foretruck;
I take my place late at night in the crow's-nest;
We sail the arctic sea--it is plenty light enough;
Through the clear atmosphere I stretch around on the wonderful beauty;
The enormous masses of ice pass me, and I pass them--the scenery is plain in all
directions;
The white-topt mountains show in the distance--I fling out my fancies toward them;
(We are approaching some great battle-field in which we are soon to be engaged;
We pass the colossal outposts of the encampment--we pass with still feet and caution;
Or we are entering by the suburbs some vast and ruin'd city;
The blocks and fallen architecture more than all the living cities of the globe.)
I am a free companion--I bivouac by invading watchfires.
I turn the bridegroom out of bed, and stay with the bride myself;
I tighten her all night to my thighs and lips.
My voice is the wife's voice, the screech by the rail of the stairs;
They fetch my man's body up, dripping and drown'd.
I understand the large hearts of heroes,
The courage of present times and all times;
How the skipper saw the crowded and rudderless wreck of the steam- ship, and Death
chasing it up and down the storm;
How he knuckled tight, and gave not back one inch, and was faithful of days and
faithful of nights,