Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/152

144 Were I to you as the boss employing and paying
 * you, would that satisfy you?

The learned, virtuous, benevolent, and the usual
 * terms,

A man like me, and never the usual terms.

Neither a servant nor a master am I, I take no sooner a large price than a small price—
 * I will have my own, whoever enjoys me,

I will be even with you, and you shall be even
 * with me.

If you stand at work in a shop, I stand as nigh as
 * the nighest in the same shop,

If you bestow gifts on your brother or dearest friend,
 * I demand as good as your brother or dearest
 * friend,

If your lover, husband, wife, is welcome by day or
 * night, I must be personally as welcome,

If you become degraded, criminal, ill, then I become
 * so for your sake,

If you remember your foolish and outlawed deeds, do
 * you think I cannot remember my own foolish
 * and outlawed deeds? plenty of them;

If you carouse at the table, I carouse at the opposite
 * side of the table,

If you meet some stranger in the streets, and love
 * him or her, do I not often meet strangers in the
 * street, and love them?

If you see a good deal remarkable in me, I see just
 * as much, perhaps more, in you.