Salut Au Monde!

O TAKE my hand Walt Whitman!
Such gliding wonders! such sights and sounds!
Such join'd unended links, each hook'd to the next,
Each answering all, each sharing the earth with all.

What widens within you Walt Whitman?
What waves and soils exuding?
What climes? what persons and cities are here?
Who are the infants, some playing, some slumbering?
Who are the girls? who are the married women?
Who are the groups of old men going slowly with their arms
     about each other's necks?
What rivers are these? what forests and fruits are these?
What are the mountains call'd that rise so high in the mists?
What myriads of dwellings are they fill'd with dwellers?

Within me latitude widens, longitude lengthens,
Asia, Africa, Europe, are to the east — America is provided
     for in the west,
Banding the bulge of the earth winds the hot equator,
Curiously north and south turn the axis-ends,
Within me is the longest day, the sun wheels in slanting rings,
     it does not set for months,
Stretch'd in due time within me the midnight sun just rises
     above the horizon and sinks again,
Within me zones, seas, cataracts, forests, volcanoes, groups,
Malaysia, Polynesia, and the great West Indian islands.

What do you hear Walt Whitman?

I hear the workman singing and the farmer's wife singing,
I hear in the distance the sounds of children and of animals
     early in the day,
I hear emulous shouts of Australians pursuing the wild horse,
I hear the Spanish dance with castanets in the chestnut shade,
     to the rebeck and guitar,
I hear continual echoes from the Thames,
I hear fierce French liberty songs,
I hear of the Italian boat-sculler the musical recitative of old
     poems,
I hear the locusts in Syria as they strike the grain and grass
     with the showers of their terrible clouds,
I hear the Coptic refrain toward sundown, pensively falling
     on the breast of the black venerable vast mother the Nile,
I hear the chirp of the Mexican muleteer, and the bells of the
     mule,
I hear the Arab muezzin calling from the top of the mosque,
I hear the Christian priests at the altars of their churches, I
     hear the responsive base and soprano,
I hear the cry of the Cossack, and the sailor's voice putting to
     sea at Okotsk,
I hear the wheeze of the slave-coffle as the slaves march on, as
     the husky gangs pass on by twos and threes, fasten'd
     together with wrist-chains and ankle-chains,
I hear the Hebrew reading his records and psalms,
I hear the rhythmic myths of the Greeks, and the strong
     legends of the Romans,
I hear the tale of the divine life and bloody death of the
     beautiful God the Christ,
I hear the Hindoo teaching his favorite pupil the loves, wars,
     adages, transmitted safely to this day from poets who
     wrote three thousand years ago.

What do you see Walt Whitman?
Who are they you salute, and that one after another salute you?

I see a great round wonder rolling through space,
I see diminute farms, hamlets, ruins, graveyards, jails, factories,
     palaces, hovels, huts of barbarians, tents of nomads
     upon the surface,
I see the shaded part on one side where the sleepers are
     sleeping, and the sunlit part on the other side,
I see the curious rapid change of the light and shade,
I see distant lands, as real and near to the inhabitants of them
     as my land is to me.

I see plenteous waters,
I see mountain peaks, I see the sierras of Andes where they
     range,
I see plainly the Himalayas, Chian Shahs, Altays, Ghauts,
I see the giant pinnacles of Elbruz, Kazbek, Bazardjusi,
I see the Styrian Alps, and the Karnac Alps,
I see the Pyrenees, Balks, Carpathians, and to the north the
     Dofrafields, and off at sea mount Hecla,
I see Vesuvius and Etna, the mountains of the Moon, and the