The Patriotic Poems of Walt Whitman
I pass to the lumber forests of the North, and again to the Southern plantation, and again to California;

Sweeping the whole I see the countless profit, the busy gatherings, earn'd wages,

See the Identity formed out of thirty-eight spacious and haughty States (and many more to come),

See forts on the shores of harbours, see ships sailing in and out;

Then over all (aye! aye!) my little and lengthen'd pennant shaped like a sword,

Runs swiftly up indicating war and defiance—and now the halyards have rais'd it,

Side of my banner broad and blue, side of my starry banner,

Discarding peace over all the sea and land.

 Banner and Pennant

Yet louder, higher, stronger, bard! yet farther, wider cleave!

No longer let our children deem us riches and peace alone,

We may be terror and carnage, and are so now,

Not now are we any one of these spacious and haughty States (nor any five, nor ten),

Nor market nor depot we, nor money-bank in the city,

But these and all, and the brown and spreading land, and the mines below, are ours,

And the shores of the sea are ours, and the rivers great and small,

And the fields they moisten, and the crops and the fruits are ours,

Bays and channels and ships sailing in and out are ours—while we over all,

Over the area spread below, the three or four millions of square miles, the capitals,

The forty millions of people—O bard! in life and death supreme,


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