2
The indications and tally of time,
Perfect sanity shows the master among philosophs,
Time, always without break, indicates itself in parts,
What always indicates the poet is the crowd of the pleasant company
    of singers, and their words,
The words of the singers are the hours or minutes of the light or dark,
    but the words of the maker of poems are the general light and dark,
The maker of poems settles justice, reality, immortality, His insight and power encircle things and the human race,
He is the glory and extract thus far of things and of the human race.

The singers do not beget, only the Poet begets,
The singers are welcom’d, understood, appear often enough, but rare
    has the day been, likewise the spot, of the birth of the maker
    of poems, the Answerer,
(Not every century nor every five centuries has contain’d such a
    day, for all its names.)

The singers of successive hours of centuries may have ostensible
    names, but the name of each of them is one of the singers,
The name of each is, eye-singer, ear-singer, head-singer,
    sweet-singer, night-singer, parlor-singer, love-singer,
    weird-singer, or something else.

All this time and at all times wait the words of true poems,
The words of true poems do not merely please,
The true poets are not followers of beauty but the august masters of beauty;
The greatness of sons is the exuding of the greatness of mothers
    and fathers,
The words of true poems are the tuft and final applause of science.

Divine instinct, breadth of vision, the law of reason, health,
    rudeness of body, withdrawnness,
Gayety, sun-tan, air-sweetness, such are some of the words of poems.

The sailor and traveler underlie the maker of poems, the Answerer,
The builder, geometer, chemist, anatomist, phrenologist, artist, all
    these underlie the maker of poems, the Answerer.

The words of the true poems give you more than poems,
They give you to form for yourself poems, religions, politics, war,
    peace, behavior, histories, essays, daily life, and every thing else,
They balance ranks, colors, races, creeds, and the sexes,
They do not seek beauty, they are sought,
Forever touching them or close upon them follows beauty, longing,
    fain, love-sick.

They prepare for death, yet are they not the finish, but rather the outset,
They bring none to his or her terminus or to be content and full,
Whom they take they take into space to behold the birth of stars, to
    learn one of the meanings,
To launch off with absolute faith, to sweep through the ceaseless
    rings and never be quiet again.

[Book X]

} Our Old Feuillage