ENVY

When I peruse the conquered fame of heroes, and the

victories of mighty generals, I do not envy the

generals,

Nor the President in his Presidency, nor the rich in his

great house;

But when I hear of the brotherhood of lovers, how it was

with them,

How through life, through dangers, odium, unchanging,

long and rong

Through youth, and through middle and old age, how

unfaltering, how affectionate and faithful they

were,

Then I am pensive--I hastily walk away, filled with the

bitterest envy.

I SIT AND LOOK OUT

I SIT and look upon all the sorrows of the world, and

upon all oppression and shame,

I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men at

anguish 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 obseve the sailors casting

lots who shall be kill'd to preserve the lives of the

rest,

I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant

persons upon labourers, 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.

FROM "LEAVES OF GRASS"

I DREAM'D in a dream I saw a city invincible to the

attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth,

I dreamed that was the new city of Friends,
Nothing was greater there then the quality of robust

love; it led the rest,

It was seen every hour in the actions of the men of that

city,

And in all their looks and words.

* * *

WHAT think you I take my pen in hand to record?
The battle-ship, perfect-modell'd, majestic, that

I saw pass the offing to-day under full sail?

The splendours of the past day? or the splendour

of the night that envelops me?

Or the vaunted glory and growth of the great city spread

around me?--no;

But merley of two simple men I saw to-day on the pier in

the midst of the crowd, parting the parting

of dear friends,

The one to remain hung on the other's neck and passionately

kiss'd him,

While the one to depart tightly prest the one to remain in

his arms.