10
Of these States the poet is the
equable man,
Not in him but off from him things are
grotesque, eccentric, fail of their
full returns,
Nothing out of its place is good,
nothing in its place is bad,
He bestows on every object or quality
its fit proportion, neither more nor
less,
He is the arbiter of the diverse, he
is the key,
He is the equalizer of his age and
land,
He supplies what wants supplying, he
checks what wants checking,
In peace out of him speaks the spirit
of peace, large, rich, thrifty, building
populous towns,
encouraging agriculture, arts,commerce, lighting
the study of man, the
soul, health, immortality, government,
In war he is the best backer of the
war, he fetches artillery as good as the
engineer’s, he can make
every word he speaks draw blood,
The years straying toward infidelity
he withholds by his steady faith,
He is no arguer, he is judgment,
(Nature accepts him absolutely,)
He judges not as the judge judges but
as the sun failing round helpless
thing,
As he sees the farthest he has the
most faith,
His thoughts are the hymns of the
praise of things,
In the dispute on God and eternity he
is silent,
He sees eternity less like a play with
a prologue and denouement,
He sees eternity in men and women, he
does not see men and women as
dreams or dots.
For the great Idea, the idea of
perfect and free individuals,
For that, the bard walks in advance,
leader of leaders,
The attitude of him cheers up slaves
and horrifies foreign despots.
Without extinction is Liberty, without
retrograde is Equality,
They live in the feelings of young men
and the best women,
(Not for nothing have the indomitable
heads of the earth been always
ready to fall for
Liberty.)
Walt Whitman - Leaves of Grass ( By Blue Ontario's Shore)
Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:
Δημοσίευση σχολίου