Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/390

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382
Leaves of Grass.

The round masts, the swinging motion of the hulls,
the slender serpentine pennants,
The large and small steamers in motion, the pilots in
their pilot-houses,
The white wake left by the passage, the quick tremulous
whirl of the wheels,
The flags of all nations, the falling of them at sun-set,
The scallop-edged waves in the twilight, the ladled
cups, the frolicsome crests and glistening,
The stretch afar growing dimmer and dimmer, the
gray walls of the granite store-houses by the
docks,
On the river the shadowy group, the big steam-tug
closely flanked on each side by the barges—the
hay-boat, the belated lighter,
On the neighboring shore, the fires from the foundry
chimneys burning high and glaringly into the
night,
Casting their flicker of black, contrasted with wild
red and yellow light, over the tops of houses,
and down into the clefts of streets.

9.These, and all else, were to me the same as they are
to you,
I project myself a moment to tell you—also I
return.

10.I loved well those cities,
I loved well the stately and rapid river,
The men and women I saw were all near to me,
Others the same—others who look back on me,
because I looked forward to them,
(The time will come, though I stop here to-day and
to-night.)