Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/415

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France.
407

4.Liberty! O mate for me!
Here too keeps the blaze, the bullet and the axe, in
reserve, to fetch them out in case of need,
Here too, though long deprest, still is not destroyed,
Here too could rise at last, murdering and extatic,
Here too would demand full arrears of vengeance.

5.Hence I sign this salute over the sea.
And I do not deny that terrible red birth and baptism,
But remember the little voice that I heard wailing—
and wait with perfect trust, no matter how long.
And from to-day, sad and cogent, I maintain the
bequeath'd cause, as for all lands.
And I send these words to Paris, with my love.
And I guess some chansonniers there will understand
them,
For I guess there is latent music yet in France—
floods of it,
O I hear already the bustle of instruments—they
will soon be drowning all that would interrupt
them,
O I think the east wind brings a triumphal and free
march,
It reaches hither—it swells me to joyful madness,
I will run transpose it in words, to justify it,
I will yet sing a song for you, ma femme.