Page:Leaves of Grass (1855).djvu/87

Gentlemen look on this curious creature,
Whatever the bids of the bidders they cannot be high enough for him,
For him the globe lay preparing quintillions of years without one animal or plant,
For him the revolving cycles truly and steadily rolled.

In that head the allbaffling brain,
In it and below it the making of the attributes of heroes.

Examine these limbs, red black or white .... they are very cunning in tendon and nerve;
They shall be stript that you may see them.

Exquisite senses, lifelit eyes, pluck, volition,
Flakes of breastmuscle, pliant backbone and neck, flesh not flabby, goodsized arms and legs,
And wonders within there yet.

Within there runs his blood .... the same old blood .. the same red running blood;
There swells and jets his heart .... There all passions and desires .. all reachings and aspirations:
Do you think they are not there because they are not expressed in parlors and lecture-rooms?

This is not only one man .... he is the father of those who shall be fathers in their turns,
In him the start of populous states and rich republics,
Of him countless immortal lives with countless embodiments and enjoyments.

How do you know who shall come from the offspring of his offspring through the centuries?
Who might you find you have come from yourself if you could trace back through the centuries?

A woman at auction,
She too is not only herself .... she is the teeming mother of mothers,
She is the bearer of them that shall grow and be mates to the mothers.

Her daughters or their daughters’ daughters .. who knows who shall mate with them?
Who knows through the centuries what heroes may come from them?

In them and of them natal love .... in them the divine mystery .... the same old beautiful mystery.

Have you ever loved a woman?