Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/47

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Leaves of Grass.
39

Of the builders and steerers of ships, and the wielders
of axes and mauls, and the drivers of horses,
I can eat and sleep with them week in and week out.

76.What is commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest, is Me,
Me going in for my chances, spending for vast
returns,
Adorning myself to bestow myself on the first that
will take me,
Not asking the sky to come down to my good will,
Scattering it freely forever.

77.The pure contralto sings in the organ loft,
The carpenter dresses his plank—the tongue of his
foreplane whistles its wild ascending lisp,
The married and unmarried children ride home to
their Thanksgiving dinner,
The pilot seizes the king-pin—he heaves down with
a strong arm,
The mate stands braced in the whale-boat—lance
and harpoon are ready,
The duck-shooter walks by silent and cautious
stretches,
The deacons are ordained with crossed hands at the
altar,
The spinning-girl retreats and advances to the hum
of the big wheel,
The farmer stops by the bars, as he walks on a First
Day loafe, and looks at the oats and rye,
The lunatic is carried at last to the asylum, a confirmed
case,
He will never sleep any more as he did in the cot in
his mother's bedroom;