O MATER! O fils!
 O brood continental!
 O flowers of the prairies!
 O space boundless! O hum of mighty products!
 O you teeming cities! O so invincible, turbulent, proud!
 O race of the future! O women!
 O fathers! O you men of passion and the storm!
 O native power only! O beauty!
 O yourself! O God! O divine average!
 O you bearded roughs! O bards! O all those slumberers! 10
 O arouse! the dawn bird's throat sounds shrill! Do you not hear the
 cock crowing?
 O, as I walk'd the beach, I heard the mournful notes foreboding a
 tempest--the low, oft-repeated shriek of the diver, the long-
 lived loon;
 O I heard, and yet hear, angry thunder;--O you sailors! O ships! make
 quick preparation!
 O from his masterful sweep, the warning cry of the eagle!
 (Give way there, all! It is useless! Give up your spoils;)
 O sarcasms! Propositions! (O if the whole world should prove indeed a
 sham, a sell!)
 O I believe there is nothing real but America and freedom!
 O to sternly reject all except Democracy!
 O imperator! O who dare confront you and me?
 O to promulgate our own! O to build for that which builds for
 mankind! 20
 O feuillage! O North! O the slope drained by the Mexican sea!
 O all, all inseparable--ages, ages, ages!
 O a curse on him that would dissever this Union for any reason
 whatever!
 O climates, labors! O good and evil! O death!
 O you strong with iron and wood! O Personality!
 O the village or place which has the greatest man or woman! even if
 it be only a few ragged huts;
 O the city where women walk in public processions in the streets, the
 same as the men;
 O a wan and terrible emblem, by me adopted!
 O shapes arising! shapes of the future centuries!
 O muscle and pluck forever for me! 30
 O workmen and workwomen forever for me!
 O farmers and sailors! O drivers of horses forever for me!
 O I will make the new bardic list of trades and tools!
 O you coarse and wilful! I love you!
 O South! O longings for my dear home! O soft and sunny airs!
 O pensive! O I must return where the palm grows and the mocking-bird
 sings, or else I die!
 O equality! O organic compacts! I am come to be your born poet!
 O whirl, contest, sounding and resounding! I am your poet, because I
 am part of you;
 O days by-gone! Enthusiasts! Antecedents!
 O vast preparations for These States! O years! 40
 O what is now being sent forward thousands of years to come!
 O mediums! O to teach! to convey the invisible faith!
 To promulge real things! to journey through all The States!
 O creation! O to-day! O laws! O unmitigated adoration!
 O for mightier broods of orators, artists, and singers!
 O for native songs! carpenter's, boatman's, ploughman's songs!
 shoemaker's songs!
 O haughtiest growth of time! O free and extatic!
 O what I, here, preparing, warble for!
 O you hastening light! O the sun of the world will ascend, dazzling,
 and take his height--and you too will ascend;
 O so amazing and so broad! up there resplendent, darting and
 burning; 50
 O prophetic! O vision staggered with weight of light! with pouring
 glories!
 O copious! O hitherto unequalled!
 O Libertad! O compact! O union impossible to dissever!
 O my Soul! O lips becoming tremulous, powerless!
 O centuries, centuries yet ahead!
 O voices of greater orators! I pause--I listen for you
 O you States! Cities! defiant of all outside authority! I spring at
 once into your arms! you I most love!
 O you grand Presidentiads! I wait for you!
 New history! New heroes! I project you!
 Visions of poets! only you really last! O sweep on! sweep on! 60
 O Death! O you striding there! O I cannot yet!
 O heights! O infinitely too swift and dizzy yet!
 O purged lumine! you threaten me more than I can stand!
 O present! I return while yet I may to you!
 O poets to come, I depend upon you!