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Rh I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out
 * of hopeful green stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord, A scented gift and remembrancer, designedly dropped, Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners,
 * that we may see and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced
 * babe of the vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic, And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and
 * narrow zones,

Growing among black folks as among white, Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them
 * the same, I receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of
 * graves.

Tenderly will I use you, curling grass, It may be you transpire from the breasts of young
 * men,

It may be if I had known them I would have loved
 * them,

It may be you are from old people, and from women,
 * and from offspring taken soon out of their
 * mothers' laps,

And here you are the mothers' laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of
 * old mothers,

Darker than the colorless beards of old men, Rh