I do not affirm what you see beyond is futile--I do not advise you to stop;
I do not say leadings you thought great are not great;
But I say that none lead to greater than those lead to.
7.
Will you seek afar off? You surely come back at last,
In things best known to you finding the best, or as good as the best,
In folks nearest to you finding the sweetest, strongest, lovingest;
Happiness, knowledge, not in another place, but this place--not for another
hour, but this hour;
Man in the first you see or touch--always in friend, brother, nighest
neighbour--Woman in mother, sister, wife;
The popular tastes and employments taking precedence in poems or anywhere,
You workwomen and workmen of these States having your own divine and strong
life,
And all else giving place to men and women like you.
_SONG OF THE BROAD-AXE._
1.
Weapon, shapely, naked, wan;
Head from the mother's bowels drawn!
Wooded flesh and metal bone! limb only one, and lip only one!
Grey-blue leaf by red-heat grown! helve produced from a little seed sown!
Resting the grass amid and upon,
To be leaned, and to lean on.
Strong shapes, and attributes of strong shapes--masculine trades, sights
and sounds;
Long varied train of an emblem, dabs of music;
Fingers of the organist skipping staccato over the keys of the great organ.
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