University of Virginia Library

1  THINK of the Soul;
I swear to you that body of yours gives proportions      to your Soul somehow to live in other spheres;
I do not know how, but I know it is so.
2  Think of loving and being loved;
I swear to you, whoever you are, you can interfuse      yourself with such things that everybody that      sees you shall look longingly upon you.
3  Think of the past;
I warn you that in a little while, others will find their      past in you and your times.
4  The race is never separated — nor man nor woman      escapes;
All is inextricable — things, spirits, nature, nations,      you too — from precedents you come.
5  Recall the ever-welcome defiers, (The mothers pre-
     cede them;)
Recall the sages, poets, saviors, inventors, lawgivers,      of the earth;
Recall Christ, brother of rejected persons — brother of      slaves, felons, idiots, and of insane and diseas'd      persons.
6  Think of the time when you was not yet born;
Think of times you stood at the side of the dying;
Think of the time when your own body will be dying.
7   Think of spiritual results,
Sure as the earth swims through the heavens, does      every one of its objects pass into spiritual      results.
8  Think of manhood, and you to be a man;
Do you count manhood, and the sweet of manhood,      nothing?
9  Think of womanhood, and you to be a woman;
The creation is womanhood;
Have I not said that womanhood involves all?
Have I not told how the universe has nothing better      than the best womanhood?

UNFOLDED out of the folds of the woman, man comes      unfolded, and is always to come unfolded;
Unfolded only out of the superbest woman of the      earth, is to come the superbest man of the      earth;
Unfolded out of the friendliest woman, is to come the      friendliest man;
Unfolded only out of the perfect body of a woman,      can a man be form'd of perfect body;
Unfolded only out of the inimitable poem of the wo-     man, can come the poems of man — (only      thence have my poems come;)
Unfolded out of the strong and arrogant woman I      love, only thence can appear the strong and      arrogant man I love;
Unfolded by brawny embraces from the well-muscled      woman I love, only thence come the brawny      embraces of the man;
Unfolded out of the folds of the woman's brain, come      all the folds of the man's brain, duly obedient;
Unfolded out of the justice of the woman, all justice      is unfolded;
Unfolded out of the sympathy of the woman is all      sympathy:
A man is a great thing upon the earth, and through      eternity — but every jot of the greatness of man      is unfolded out of woman,
First the man is shaped in the woman, he can then be      shaped in himself.

1  NIGHT on the prairies;
The supper is over — the fire on the ground burns      low;
The wearied emigrants sleep, wrapt in their blankets;
I walk by myself — I stand and look at the stars,      which I think now I never realized before.
2  Now I absorb immortality and peace,
I admire death, and test propositions.
3  How plenteous! How spiritual! How resumé!
The same Old Man and Soul — the same old aspira-     tions, and the same content.
4  I was thinking the day most splendid, till I saw      what the not-day exhibited,
I was thinking this globe enough, till there sprang      out so noiseless around me myriads of other      globes.
5  Now, while the great thoughts of space and eternity      fill me, I will measure myself by them;
And now, touch'd with the lives of other globes, ar-     rived as far along as those of the earth,
Or waiting to arrive, or pass'd on farther than those      of the earth,
I henceforth no more ignore them, than I ignore my      own life,
Or the lives of the earth arrived as far as mine, or      waiting to arrive.
6  O I see now that life cannot exhibit all to me — as      the day cannot,
I see that I am to wait for what will be exhibited by      death.

THE world below the brine;
Forests at the bottom of the sea — the branches and      leaves,
Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seeds —      the thick tangle, the openings, and the pink      turf,
Different colors, pale gray and green, purple, white,      and gold — the play of light through the water,
Dumb swimmers there among the rocks — coral, gluten,      grass, rushes — and the aliment of the swimmers,
Sluggish existences grazing there, suspended, or      slowly crawling close to the bottom,
The sperm-whale at the surface, blowing air and      spray, or disporting with his flukes,
The leaden-eyed shark, the walrus, the turtle, the      hairy sea-leopard, and the sting-ray;
Passions there — wars, pursuits, tribes — sight in those      ocean-depths — breathing that thick-breathing      air, as so many do;
The change thence to the sight here, and to the subtle      air breathed by beings like us, who walk this      sphere;
The change onward from ours, to that of beings who      walk other spheres.

I SIT and look out upon all the sorrows of the world,      and upon all oppression and shame;
I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men, at an-     guish with themselves, remorseful after deeds      done;
I see, in low life, the mother misused by her children,      dying, neglected, gaunt, desperate;
I see the wife misused by her husband — I see the      treacherous seducer of young women;
I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited      love, attempted to be hid — I see these sights      on the earth;
I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny — I      see martyrs and prisoners;
I observe a famine at sea — I observe the sailors cast-     ing lots who shall be kill'd, to preserve the      lives of the rest;
I observe the slights and degradations cast by arro-     gant persons upon laborers, the poor, and upon      negroes, and the like;
All these — All the meanness and agony without end,      I sitting, look out upon,
See, hear, and am silent.