University of Virginia Library

GIVE me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-     dazzling;
Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the      orchard;
Give me a field where the unmow'd grass grows;
Give me an arbor, give me the trellis'd grape;
Give me fresh corn and wheat — give me serene-moving      animals, teaching content;
Give me nights perfectly quiet, as on high plateaus west      of the Mississippi, and I looking up at the stars;
Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers,      where I can walk undisturb'd;
Give me for marriage a sweet-breath'd woman, of whom      I should never tire;
Give me a perfect child — give me, away, aside from the      noise of the world, a rural domestic life;
Give me to warble spontaneous songs, reliev'd, recluse      by myself, for my own ears only;
Give me solitude — give me Nature — give me again,      O Nature, your primal sanities!
— These, demanding to have them, (tired with ceaseless      excitement, and rack'd by the war-strife;)
These to procure, incessantly asking, rising in cries from      my heart,
While yet incessantly asking, still I adhere to my city;
Day upon day, and year upon year, O city, walking      your streets,
Where you hold me enchain'd a certain time, refusing      to give me up;
Yet giving to make me glutted, enrich'd of soul — you      give me forever faces;
(O I see what I sought to escape, confronting, reversing      my cries;
I see my own soul trampling down what it ask'd for.)

Keep your splendid silent sun;
Keep your woods, O Nature, and the quiet places by      the woods;
Keep your fields of clover and timothy, and your corn-     fields and orchards;
Keep the blossoming buckwheat fields, where the Ninth-     month bees hum;
Give me faces and streets! give me these phantoms in-     cessant and endless along the trottoirs!
Give me interminable eyes! give me women! give me      comrades and lovers by the thousand!
Let me see new ones every day! let me hold new ones      by the hand every day!
Give me such shows! give me the streets of Manhattan!
Give me Broadway, with the soldiers marching — give      me the sound of the trumpets and drums!
(The soldiers in companies or regiments — some, starting      away, flush'd and reckless;
Some, their time up, returning, with thinn'd ranks —      young, yet very old, worn, marching, noticing      nothing;)
— Give me the shores and the wharves heavy-fringed      with the black ships!
O such for me! O an intense life! O full to repletion,      and varied!
The life of the theatre, bar-room, huge hotel, for me!
The saloon of the steamer! the crowded excursion for      me! the torch-light procession!
The dense brigade, bound for the war, with high piled      military wagons following;
People, endless, streaming, with strong voices, passions,      pageants;
Manhattan streets, with their powerful throbs, with the      beating drums, as now;
The endless and noisy chorus, the rustle and clank of      muskets, (even the sight of the wounded;)
Manhattan crowds with their turbulent musical chorus       — with varied chorus and light of the sparkling      eyes;
Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me.