prairies

dwellers in Manhattan,

Or with large steps crossing the prairies out of Illinois and

Indiana,

Murmurs and echoes still bring up—Eternity’s music, faint and far,

Wafted inland, sent from Atlantica’s rim—strains for the Soul of the Prairies,

Whisper’d reverberations—chords for the ear of the West, joyously sounding

Long I roam'd the woods of the north, long I watch'd Niagara pouring,

I travel'd the prairies over and slept on their breast, I cross'd the

Nevadas, I cross'd the plateaus,

Thy trills of shrieks by rocks and hills return’d,

Launch’d o’er the prairies wide—across the lakes,

To the free skies, unpent, and glad, and strong.

To the rocks I calling sing, and all the trees in the woods,

To the plains of the poems of heroes, to the prairies spreading wide,

To the far-off sea and the unseen winds, and the sane impalpable air;

The noble son on sinewy feet advancing,

I saw, out of the land of prairies, land of Ohio's waters and of

Indiana,

Blown from the Eastern sea and blown from the Western sea, till

there on the prairies meeting,

These and with these and the breath of my chant,

I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America,

and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies,

I will make inseparable cities with their arms about each other’s necks,