ÔBROOKLYN, OF AMPLE HILLS, WAS MINEŐ

  'BROOKLYN, OF AMPLE HILLS, WAS MINE'


A century ago,
	It avails not, neither time or place-distance avails not....
in this house, 
	Just as you feel when you look on the river and sky, so I felt...
up that stoop,
	I too many and many a time cross'd the river...
at 99 Ryerson St.,
	Had my eyes dazzled by the shimmering track of beams...
in the City of Brooklyn,
	I loved well those cities;  I loved well the stately and rapid river...
a poet's mind swelled
	I too lived, Brooklyn, of ample hills, was mine...
to flood tide, suspending 
	I too walk'd the streets of Manhattan Island...
us like a great arcing bridge 
	I too felt the curious abrupt questionings stir within me...
above the Fulton fish 
	In my walks home late at night...they came upon me.... 
market at dawn, the 
	I was call'd by my nighest name ...
peddlers hawking their
	Saw many I loved in the street...
wares on Delancy St., 
	yet never told them a word...
the smell of the pickle 
	Play'd the part that still looks back on the actor or actress...
barrels, the clopping of shod 
	 consider'd long and seriously of you before you were born... 
horses on the "granite floor,"
	What sight can ever be more stately ...than my mast-hemm'd Manhattan
the mad-rushing crowds on 
	Flow on, river! flow with the flood-tide, and ebb with the ebb-tide!  ...
Broadway, and the 
	Gorgeous clouds of the sun-set!...
stevedores flashing
	Stand up, tall masts of Mannahatta!...
their hooks on the 
	Throb, baffled and curious brain! ...
docks, then the ferry boat
	Play the old role...great or small, according as one makes it! ...
slip at the "sidle" of evening,
	Be firm, rail over the river, to support those who lean idly...
tired working people
	Fly on, sea-birds! ...
crossing to home,
	Diverge, fine spokes of light ... in the sun-lit water...
two heads turning 
	Thrive, cities!
by the rail, and  
	There is perfection in you also...
a glance 
	You furnish your parts toward eternity...
exchanged.


Where Walt Whitman wrote the first edition
of Leave of Grass a century ago.
With lines from 
'Crossing Brooklyn Ferry'
August 2004