Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/70

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
62
Leaves of Grass.

Deluding my confusion with the calm of the sun-light
and pasture-fields,
Immodestly sliding the fellow-senses away,
They bribed to swap off with touch, and go and graze
at the edges of me,
No consideration, no regard for my draining strength
or my anger,
Fetching the rest of the herd around to enjoy them
a while,
Then all uniting to stand on a headland and worry
me.

179.The sentries desert every other part of me,
They have left me helpless to a red marauder,
They all come to the headland, to witness and assist
against me.

180.I am given up by traitors,
I talk wildly—I have lost my wits—I and nobody
else am the greatest traitor,
I went myself first to the headland—my own hands
carried me there.

181.You villain touch! what are you doing? My breath
is tight in its throat,
Unclench your floodgates! you are too much for me.

182.Blind, loving, wrestling touch! sheathed, hooded,
sharp-toothed touch!
Did it make you ache so, leaving me?

183.Parting, tracked by arriving—perpetual payment of
perpetual loan,