on short curly grass,
See, in my poems, cities, solid, vast, inland, with paved
streets, with iron and stone
edifices, ceaseless vehicles,
and commerce,
See, the many-cylinder'd steam printing-press — see, the
electric telegraph stretching across the continent,
See, through Atlantica's depths pulses American Europe
reaching, pulses of Europe duly return'd,
See, the strong and quick locomotive as it departs, panting,
blowing the steam-whistle,
See, ploughmen ploughing farms — see, miners digging mines
— see, the
numberless factories,
See, mechanics busy at their benches with tools — see from
among them superior judges, philosophs,
Presidents,
emerge, drest in working dresses,
See, lounging through the shops and fields of the States,
me
well-belov'd, close-held by day and night,
Hear the loud echoes of my songs there — read the hints
come
at last.
O camerado close! O you and me at last, and us two only.
O a word to clear one's path ahead endlessly!
O
something ecstatic and undemonstrable! O music wild!
O now I triumph — and you shall also;
O hand in
hand — O wholesome pleasure — O one more
desirer and lover!
O to haste firm holding — to haste,
haste on with me.
1860 1881