Page:Leaves of Grass (1860).djvu/78

70 Where herds of buffalo make a crawling spread
 * of the square miles far and near,

Where the humming-bird shimmers—Where the
 * neck of the long-lived swan is curving and
 * winding,

Where the laughing-gull scoots by the shore, where
 * she laughs her near-human laugh,

Where bee-hives range on a gray bench in the garden,
 * half hid by the high weeds,

Where band-necked partridges roost in a ring on the
 * ground with their heads out,

Where burial coaches enter the arched gates of a
 * cemetery,

Where winter wolves bark amid wastes of snow and
 * icicled trees,

Where the yellow-crowned heron comes to the edge of
 * the marsh at night and feeds upon small crabs,

Where the splash of swimmers and divers cools the
 * warm noon,

Where the katy-did works her chromatic reed on the
 * walnut-tree over the well,

Through patches of citrons and cucumbers with
 * silver-wired leaves,

Through the salt-lick or orange glade, or under
 * conical firs,

Through the gymnasium—through the curtained
 * saloon—through the office or public hall,

Pleased with the native, and pleased with the foreign
 * —pleased with the new and old,

Pleased with women, the homely as well as the
 * handsome,

Pleased with the quakeress as she puts off her bonnet
 * and talks melodiously,