Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/78

Where herds of buffalo make a crawling spread
of the square miles far and near,
Where the humming-bird shimmers—Where the
neck of the long-lived swan is curving and
winding,
Where the laughing-gull scoots by the shore, where
she laughs her near-human laugh,
Where bee-hives range on a gray bench in the garden,
half hid by the high weeds,
Where band-necked partridges roost in a ring on the
ground with their heads out,
Where burial coaches enter the arched gates of a
cemetery,
Where winter wolves bark amid wastes of snow and
icicled trees,
Where the yellow-crowned heron comes to the edge of
the marsh at night and feeds upon small crabs,
Where the splash of swimmers and divers cools the
warm noon,
Where the katy-did works her chromatic reed on the
walnut-tree over the well,
Through patches of citrons and cucumbers with
silver-wired leaves,
Through the salt-lick or orange glade, or under
conical firs,
Through the gymnasium—through the curtained
saloon—through the office or public hall,
Pleased with the native, and pleased with the foreign
—pleased with the new and old,
Pleased with women, the homely as well as the
handsome,
Pleased with the quakeress as she puts off her bonnet
and talks melodiously,