3
You air that serves me with breath to speak! |
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| You objects that call from diffusion my meanings, and give them shape! |
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| You light that wraps me and all things in delicate equable showers! |
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| You paths worn in the irregular hollows by the roadsides! |
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| I think you are latent with unseen existences—you are so dear to me. |
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| You flagg’d walks of the cities! you strong curbs at the edges! |
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| You ferries! you planks and posts of wharves! you timber-lined sides! you distant ships! |
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| You rows of houses! you window-pierc’d façades! you roofs! |
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| You porches and entrances! you copings and iron guards! |
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| You windows whose transparent shells might expose so much! |
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| You doors and ascending steps! you arches! |
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| You gray stones of interminable pavements! you trodden crossings! |
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| From all that has been near you, I believe you have imparted to yourselves, and now would impart the same secretly to me; |
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| From the living and the dead I think you have peopled your impassive surfaces, and the spirits thereof would be evident and amicable with me. |
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4
The earth expanding right hand and left hand, |
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| The picture alive, every part in its best light, |
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| The music falling in where it is wanted, and stopping where it is not wanted, |
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| The cheerful voice of the public road—the gay fresh sentiment of the road. |
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| O highway I travel! O public road! do you say to me, Do not leave me? |
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| Do you say, Venture not? If you leave me, you are lost? |
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| Do you say, I am already prepared—I am well-beaten and undenied—adhere to me? |
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| O public road! I say back, I am not afraid to leave you—yet I love you; |
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| You express me better than I can express myself; |
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| You shall be more to me than my poem. |
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| I think heroic deeds were all conceiv’d in the open air, and all great poems also; |
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| I think I could stop here myself, and do miracles; |
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| (My judgments, thoughts, I henceforth try by the open air, the road;) |
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| I think whatever I shall meet on the road I shall like, and whoever beholds me shall like me; |
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| I think whoever I see must be happy. |
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David Levinson, Transportist 