Ma femme! for the brood beyond us and of us,
For those who belong here and those to come,
I exultant to be ready for them will now shake out carols
     stronger and haughtier than have ever yet been heard
     upon earth.
I will make the songs of passion to give them their way,
And your songs outlaw'd offenders, for I scan you with
     kindred eyes, and carry you with me the same as any.

I will make the true poem of riches,
To earn for the body and the mind whatever adheres and
     goes forward and is not dropt by death;
I will effuse egotism and show it underlying all, and I will be
     the bard of personality,
And I will show of male and female that either is but the
     equal of the other,
And sexual organs and acts! do you concentrate in me, for I
     am determin'd to tell you with courageous clear voice to
     prove you illustrious,
And I will show that there is no imperfection in the present,
     and can be none in the future,
And I will show that whatever happens to anybody it may be
     turn'd to beautiful results,
And I will show that nothing can happen more beautiful than
     death,
And I will thread a thread through my poems that time and
     events are compact,
And that all the things of the universe are perfect miracles,
     each as profound as any.

I will not make poems with reference to parts,
But I will make poems, songs, thoughts, with reference to
     ensemble,
And I will not sing with reference to a day, but with reference
     to all days,
And I will not make a poem nor the least part of a poem but
     has reference to the soul,
Because having look'd at the objects of the universe, I find
     there is no one nor any particle of one but has reference
     to the soul.

Was somebody asking to see the soul?
See, your own shape and countenance, persons, substances,
     beasts, the trees, the running rivers, the rocks and sands.

All hold spiritual joys and afterwards loosen them;
How can the real body ever die and be buried?

Of your real body and any man's or woman's real body,
Item for item it will elude the hands of the corpse- cleaners
     and pass to fitting spheres,
Carrying what has accrued to it from the moment of birth to
     the moment of death.

Not the types set up by the printer return their impression,
     the meaning, the main concern,
Any more than a man's substance and life or a woman's
     substance and life return in the body and the soul,
Indifferently before death and after death.

Behold, the body includes and is the meaning, the main
     concern, and includes and is the soul;
Whoever you are, how superb and how divine is your body,
     or any part of it!

Whoever you are, to you endless announcements!

Daughter of the lands did you wait for your poet?
Did you wait for one with a flowing mouth and indicative
     hand?
Toward the male of the States, and toward the female of the
     States,
Exulting words, words to Democracy's lands.

Interlink'd, food-yielding lands!
Land of coal and iron! land of gold! land of cotton, sugar,
     rice!
Land of wheat, beef, pork! land of wool and hemp! land of
     the apple and the grape!
Land of the pastoral plains, the grass-fields of the world! land
     of those sweet-air'd interminable plateaus!
Land of the herd, the garden, the healthy house of adobie!
Lands where the north-west Columbia winds, and where the
     south-west Colorado winds!
Land of the eastern Chesapeake! land of the Delaware!
Land of Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan!
Land of the Old Thirteen! Massachusetts land! land of
    Vermont and Connecticut!

Land of the ocean shores! land of sierras and peaks!
Land of boatmen and sailors! fishermen's land!
Inextricable lands! the clutch'd together! the passionate
     ones!
The side by side! the elder and younger brothers! the
    bony-limb'd!
The great women's land! the feminine! the experienced sisters
     and the inexperienced