When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd

When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd,
And the great star early droop'd in the western sky in the night,
I mourn'd, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

[Ever-returning]1 spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming [perennial and drooping star in the west]2,
And thought of him I love.

O powerful western fallen star!
O shades of night! O moody, tearful night!
O great star disappear'd! O the black murk that hides the star!
O cruel hands that hold me powerless! O helpless soul of me!
O harsh surrounding cloud, that will not free my soul!

In the dooryard fronting an old farm-house near the white-wash'd palings,
Stands the lilac-bush, tall-growing, with heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
With many a pointed blossom, rising, delicate, with the perfume strong I love,
With every leaf a miracle ... and from this bush [in the door-yard,
With delicate-color'd blossoms, and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,]1
A sprig, with its flower, I break.

In the swamp in secluded recesses,
A shy and hidden bird is warbling a song.

Solitary the thrush,
The hermit withdrawn to himself, avoiding the settlements,
Sings by himself a song.

Song of the bleeding throat!
Death's outlet song of life -- (for well, dear brother, I know
If thou wast not [gifted]1 to sing, thou would'st surely die.)

Over the breast of the spring, the land, amid cities,
Amid lanes and through old woods, (where lately the violets peep'd 
  from the ground,  ... 
Amid the grass in the fields each side of the lanes --
  passing the endless grass;
Passing the yellow-spear'd wheat, every grain from its shroud
  in the dark-brown fields uprisen,
Passing the apple-tree blows of white and pink in the orchards;
Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest in the grave,
Night and day journeys a coffin.

Coffin that passes through lanes and streets,
Through day and night with the great cloud darkening the land,
With the pomp of the inloop'd flags with the cities draped in black,
With the show of the States themselves as of crepe-veil'd women standing,
With processions long and winding and the flambeaus of the night,
 ...  with the silent sea of faces and the unbared heads,
With the waiting depot, the arriving coffin, and the sombre faces,
With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and solemn,
 ...  pour'd around the coffin,
The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs -- where amid these you journey,
and the tolling bells' perpetual clang,
Here, coffin that slowly passes,
I give you a sprig of lilac.

(Nor for you, for one alone,
Blossoms and branches green to coffins all I bring,
For fresh as the morning, thus would I chant a song for you O sane and sacred death.

All over bouquets of roses,
O death, I cover you with roses and early lilies,
But mostly and now the lilac that blooms the first,
 ... 
With loaded arms I come, pouring for you,
For you and the coffins all of you, O death.)

O western orb sailing the heaven,
Now I know what you must have meant as a month since I walk'd,
As I walk'd in silence the transparent shadowy night,
As I saw you had something to tell as you bent to me night after night,
As you droop'd from the sky low down as if to my side, (while the other stars all look'd on,)
As we wander'd together  ...  I saw  ...  how full you were of woe,
As I stood  ...  in the cool transparent night,
As I watch'd where you pass'd  ... 
As my soul in its trouble  ...  sank,  ... 

Sing on, there in the swamp! 
O singer bashful and tender,  ...  I come  ...  I understand you,
But a moment I linger, for  ... 
The star, my departing comrade, holds and detains me.

O how shall I warble myself for the dead one there I loved?
And how shall I deck my soul for the large sweet soul that has gone?
And what shall my perfume be to adorn the grave of him I love?

Sea-winds blown from the east and west,
Blown from the Eastern sea and blown from the Western sea,  ...  with these  ... 
Will I perfume the grave of him I love.

O  ...  what shall the pictures be that I hang on the walls,
To adorn the burial-house of him I love?

Pictures of growing spring and farms and homes,
With the Fourth-month eve at sundown, and the gray smoke lucid and bright,
With floods of the yellow gold of the gorgeous, indolent, sinking sun, burning, expanding the air,
With the fresh sweet herbage under foot, and the pale green leaves of the trees prolific,
In the distance of the flowing glaze, the breast of the river, with a wind-dapple here and there,
With ranging hills on the banks, with many a line against the sky, and shadows,
And the city at hand with dwellings so dense, and stacks of chimneys,
And all the scenes of life and the workshops, and the workmen homeward returning.

Lo, body and soul -- this land,
My own Manhattan with spires, and the sparkling and hurrying tides, and the ships,
The varied and ample land, the South and the North in the light, Ohio's shores and flashing Missouri,
And ever the far-spreading prairies cover'd with grass and corn.

Lo, the most excellent sun so calm and haughty,
The violet and purple morn with just-felt breezes,
The gentle soft-born measureless light,
The miracle spreading bathing all, the fulfill'd noon,
The coming eve delicious, the welcome night and the stars,
Over my cities shining all, enveloping man and land.

Sing on, sing on, you gray-brown bird,
Sing from the swamps, the recesses, pour your chant from the bushes,
Limitless  ...  out of the cedars and pines.

Sing on dearest brother, warble your reedy song,
Loud human song, with voice of uttermost woe.

O liquid and free and tender!
O wild and loose to my soul -- O wondrous singer!
You only I hear -- yet the star holds me, (but will soon depart,)
Yet the lilac with mastering odor holds me.

Now while I sat in the day, and look'd forth,
In the close of the day, with its light, and the fields of spring, 
  and the farmer preparing his crops,
In the large unconscious scenery of my land, with its lakes and forests,
In the heavenly aerial beauty,  ... 
Under the arching heavens of the afternoon swift passing, 
  and the voices of children and women,
The many-moving sea-tides, -- and  ...  the ships how they sail'd,
And the summer approaching with richness, and the fields all busy with labor,
And the infinite separate houses, how they all went on, 
  each with its meals and minutia of daily usages;
And the streets, how their throbbings throbb'd, 
  and the cities pent -- lo!  ... 
Falling upon them all, and among them all, enveloping me with the rest,
Appear'd the cloud, appear'd the long black trail;
And I knew Death, its thought, and the sacred knowledge of death.

Then with the knowledge of death as walking one side of me,
And the thought of death close-walking the other side of me,
 ...  
  and as holding the hands of companions,
I fled forth to the hiding receiving night,  ... 
Down to the shores of the water,  ... 
To the solemn shadowy cedars and the ghostly pines so still.

And the singer so shy to the rest  ...  received us comrades three,
And he sang what seem'd the carol of death, and a verse for him I love.

 ... 
And  ...  my spirit tallied the song of the bird.

Come lovely and soothing death,
Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving,
In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
Sooner or later, delicate death.

Prais'd be the fathomless universe,
For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious;
And for love, sweet love -- But praise! praise!
For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death.

Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet,
Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome?

Then I chant it for thee -- I glorify thee above all;
I bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come unfalteringly.

Approach, strong Deliveress,
When it is so, when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing the dead,	
Lost in the loving, floating ocean of thee,
Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death.

From me to thee glad serenades,
Dances for thee I propose, saluting thee, adornments and feastings for thee;
And the sights of the open landscape, and the high-spread sky, are fitting,
And life and the fields, and the huge and thoughtful night.

The night, in silence, under many a star;
The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose voice I know;	
And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veil'd Death,
And the body gratefully nestling close to thee.

Over the tree-tops I float thee a song!
Over the rising and sinking waves -- over the myriad fields, and the prairies wide;
Over the dense-pack'd cities all, and the teeming wharves and ways,	
I float this carol with joy, with joy to thee, O Death!

To the tally of my soul,
Loud and strong kept up the gray-brown bird,
With pure deliberate notes, spreading, filling the night.

Loud in the pines and cedars dim,
Clear in the freshness moist and the swamp-perfume,
And I with my comrades there in the night.

While my sight  ...  unclosed,
As to long panoramas of visions.

And I saw askant the armies,
 ...  I saw, as in noiseless dreams, hundreds of battle-flags;
Borne through the smoke of the battles, and pierc'd with missiles, I saw them,
And carried hither and yon through the smoke, and torn and bloody;
And at last for a few shreds left on the staffs, (all in silence,)
And the staffs all splinter'd and broken.

I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them,
And the white skeletons of young men -- I saw them,
I saw the debris and debris of all the dead soldiers of the war;
and we saw they were not as was thought,
They themselves were fully at rest -- they suffer'd not;
The living remain'd and suffer'd -- the mother suffer'd,
And the wife and the child, and the musing comrade suffer'd,
And the armies that remain'd suffer'd.

Passing the visions, passing the night;
Passing, unloosing the hold of my comrades' hands;
Passing the song of the hermit bird and the tallying song of my soul,
 ... 
Passing, I leave thee, lilac with heart-shaped leaves;
I leave thee there in the door-yard, blooming, returning with spring,
I cease from my song for thee;
From my gaze on thee in the west,  ...  communing with thee,
O comrade lustrous, with silver face in the night.

Yet each I keep and all, retrievements out of the night;
 ... 
For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and lands -- 
 ... 
Lilac and star and bird twined with the chant of my soul,
There in the fragrant pines, and the cedars dusk and dim.