Out from behind this bending, rough-cut Mask,
(All straighter, liker Masks rejected – this preferr’d,)
This common curtain of the face, contain’d in me for me, in you for you, in each for each,
(Tragedies, sorrows, laughter, tears – O heaven!
The passionate, teeming plays this curtain hid!)
This glaze of God’s serenest, purest sky,
This film of Satan’s seething pit,
This heart’s geography’s map – this limitless small continent – this soundless sea;
Out from the convolutions of this globe,
This subtler astronomic orb than sun or moon – than Jupiter, Venus, Mars;
This condensation of the Universe – (nay, here the only Universe,
Here the idea all in this mystic handful wrapt;)
These burin’d eyes, flashing to you, to pass to future time,
To launch and spin through space revolving, sideling – from these to emanate,
To You, whoe’er you are a Look.
A Traveler of thoughts and years – of peace and war,
Of youth long sped, and middle age declining,
(As the first volume of a tale perused and laid away, and this the second,
Songs, ventures, speculations, presently to close,)
Lingering a moment, here and now, to You I opposite turn,
As on the road, or at some crevice door, by chance, or open’d window,
Pausing, inclining, baring my head, You specially I greet,
To draw and clench your Soul, for once, inseparably with mine,
Then travel, travel on.