Poets' Corner - Carl Sandburg

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Selections from Chicago Poems by Carl Sandburg (1916)

inscribed "To My Wife and pal, Lillian Steichen Sandburg

CHICAGO

HOG Butcher for the World,; Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,; Player with Railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler;; Stormy, husky, brawling,; City of the Big Shoulders:
They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I: have seen your painted women under the gas lamps; luring the farm boys.
And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it: is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to; kill again.
And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the: faces of women and children I have seen the marks; of wanton hunger.
And having answered so I turn once more to those who: sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer; and say to them:
Come and show me another city with lifted head singing: so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.
Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on: job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the; little soft cities;
Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning: as a savage pitted against the wilderness,; Bareheaded,; Shoveling,; Wrecking,; Planning,; Building, breaking, rebuilding,
Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with: white teeth,
Under the terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young: man laughs,
Laughing even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has: never lost a battle,
Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse.: and under his ribs the heart of the people,; Laughing!
Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of: Youth, half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog; Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with; Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.; Carl Sandburg

LOST

DESOLATE and lone
All night long on the lake
Where fog trails and mist creeps,
The whistle of a boat
Calls and cries unendingly,
Like some lost child
In tears and trouble
Hunting the harbor's breast
And the harbor's eyes.: Carl Sandburg

THE HARBOR

PASSING through huddled and ugly walls
By doorways where women
Looked from their hunger-deep eyes,
Haunted with shadows of hunger-hands,
Out from the huddled and ugly walls,
I came sudden, at the city's edge,
On a blue burst of lake,
Long lake waves breaking under the sun
On a spray-flung curve of shore;
And a fluttering storm of gulls,
Masses of great gray wings
And flying white bellies
Veering and wheeling free in the open.: Carl Sandburg

CLARK STREET BRIDGE

DUST of the feet
And dust of the wheels,
Wagons and people going,
All day feet and wheels.
Now. . .
. . Only stars and mist
A lonely policeman,
Two cabaret dancers,
Stars and mist again,
No more feet or wheels,
No more dust and wagons.: Voices of dollars; And drops of blood; . . . . .; Voices of broken hearts,; . . Voices singing, singing,; . . Silver voices, singing,; Softer than the stars,; Softer than the mist.; Carl Sandburg

PASSERS-BY

PASSERS-BY,
Out of your many faces
Flash memories to me
Now at the day end
Away from the sidewalks
Where your shoe soles traveled
And your voices rose and blent
To form the city's afternoon roar
Hindering an old silence.
Passers-by,
I remember lean ones among you,
Throats in the clutch of a hope,
Lips written over with strivings,
Mouths that kiss only for love.
Records of great wishes slept with,: Held long
And prayed and toiled for. .: Yes,
Written on
Your mouths
And your throats
I read them
When you passed by.: Carl Sandburg

A TEAMSTER'S FAREWELL

Sobs En Route to a Penitentiary

GOOD-BY now to the streets and the clash of wheels and

locking hubs,

The sun coming on the brass buckles and harness knobs.

The muscles of the horses sliding under their heavy

haunches,

Good-by now to the traffic policeman and his whistle,

The smash of the iron hoof on the stones,

All the crazy wonderful slamming roar of the street--

O God, there's noises I'm going to be hungry for.

Carl Sandburg

PICNIC BOAT

SUNDAY night and the park policemen tell each other it: is dark as a stack of black cats on Lake Michigan.
A big picnic boat comes home to Chicago from the peach: farms of Saugatuck.
Hundreds of electric bulbs break the night's darkness, a: flock of red and yellow birds with wings at a standstill.
Running along the deck railings are festoons and leaping: in curves are loops of light from prow and stern; to the tall smokestacks.
Over the hoarse crunch of waves at my pier comes a: hoarse answer in the rhythmic oompa of the brasses; playing a Polish folk-song for the home-comers.; Carl Sandburg

HAPPINESS

I ASKED the professors who teach the meaning of life to tell: me what is happiness.
And I went to famous executives who boss the work of: thousands of men.
They all shook their heads and gave me a smile as though: I was trying to fool with them
And then one Sunday afternoon I wandered out along: the Desplaines river
And I saw a crowd of Hungarians under the trees with: their women and children and a keg of beer and an; accordion.; Carl Sandburg

ONION DAYS

MRS. GABRIELLE GIOVANNITTI comes along Peoria Street: every morning at nine o'clock
With kindling wood piled on top of her head, her eyes: looking straight ahead to find the way for her old feet.
Her daughter-in-law, Mrs. Pietro Giovannitti, whose: husband was killed in a tunnel explosion through; the negligence of a fellow-servant,
Works ten hours a day, sometimes twelve, picking onions: for Jasper on the Bowmanville road.
She takes a street car at half-past five in the morning,: Mrs. Pietro Giovannitti does,
And gets back from Jasper's with cash for her day's: work, between nine and ten o'clock at night.
Last week she got eight cents a box, Mrs. Pietro: Giovannitti, picking onions for Jasper,
But this week Jasper dropped the pay to six cents a: box because so many women and girls were answering; the ads in the Daily News.
Jasper belongs to an Episcopal church in Ravenswood: and on certain Sundays
He enjoys chanting the Nicene creed with his daughters: on each side of him joining their voices with his.
If the preacher repeats old sermons of a Sunday, Jasper's: mind wanders to his 700-acre farm and how he; can make it produce more efficiently
And sometimes he speculates on whether he could word: an ad in the Daily News so it would bring more; women and girls out to his farm and reduce operating; costs.
Mrs. Pietro Giovannitti is far from desperate about life;: her joy is in a child she knows will arrive to her in; three months.
And now while these are the pictures for today there are: other pictures of the Giovannitti people I could give; you for to-morrow,
And how some of them go to the county agent on winter: mornings with their baskets for beans and cornmeal; and molasses.
I listen to fellows saying here's good stuff for a novel or: it might be worked up into a good play.
I say there's no dramatist living can put old Mrs.: Gabrielle Giovannitti into a play with that kindling; wood piled on top of her head coming along Peoria; Street nine o'clock in the morning.; Carl Sandburg

A FENCE

Now the stone house on the lake front is finished and the: workmen are beginning the fence.
The palings are made of iron bars with steel points that: can stab the life out of any man who falls on them.
As a fence, it is a masterpiece, and will shut off the rabble: and all vagabonds and hungry men and all wandering; children looking for a place to play.
Passing through the bars and over the steel points will go: nothing except Death and the Rain and To-morrow.; Carl Sandburg

ANNA IMROTH

CROSS the hands over the breast here--so.
Straighten the legs a little more--so.
And call for the wagon to come and take her home.
Her mother will cry some and so will her sisters and: brothers.
But all of the others got down and they are safe and: this is the only one of the factory girls who; wasn't lucky in making the jump when the fire broke.
It is the hand of God and the lack of fire escapes.: Carl Sandburg

CUMULATIVES

STORMS have beaten on this point of land
And ships gone to wreck here: and the passers-by remember it; with talk on the deck at night; as they near it.
Fists have beaten on the face of this old prize-fighter
And his battles have held the sporting pages: and on the street they indicate him with their; right fore-finger as one who once wore; a championship belt.
A hundred stories have been published and a thousand rumored
About why this tall dark man has divorced two beautiful: young women
And married a third who resembles the first two: and they shake their heads and say, "There he; goes,"; when he passes by in sunny weather or in rain; along the city streets.; Carl Sandburg

LIMITED

I AM riding on a limited express, one of the crack trains: of the nation.
Hurtling across the prairie into blue haze and dark air: go fifteen all-steel coaches holding a thousand people.
(All the coaches shall be scrap and rust and all the men: and women laughing in the diners and sleepers shall; pass to ashes.)
I ask a man in the smoker where he is going and he: answers: "Omaha."; Carl Sandburg

FELLOW CITIZENS

I DRANK musty ale at the Illinois Athletic Club with: the millionaire manufacturer of Green River butter; one night
And his face had the shining light of an old-time Quaker,: he spoke of a beautiful daughter, and I knew he had; a peace and a happiness up his sleeve somewhere.
Then I heard Jim Kirch make a speech to the Advertising: Association on the trade resources of South America.
And the way he lighted a three-for-a-nickel stogie and: cocked it at an angle regardless of the manners of; our best people,
I knew he had a clutch on a real happiness even though: some of the reporters on his newspaper say he is; the living double of Jack London's Sea Wolf.
In the mayor's office the mayor himself told me he was: happy though it is a hard job to satisfy all the office-; seekers and eat all the dinners he is asked to eat.
Down in Gilpin Place, near Hull House, was a man with: his jaw wrapped for a bad toothache,
And he had it all over the butter millionaire, Jim Kirch: and the mayor when it came to happiness.
He is a maker of accordions and guitars and not only: makes them from start to finish, but plays them; after he makes them.
And he had a guitar of mahogany with a walnut bottom: he offered for seven dollars and a half if I wanted it,
And another just like it, only smaller, for six dollars,: though he never mentioned the price till I asked him,
And he stated the price in a sorry way, as though the: music and the make of an instrument count for a; million times more than the price in money.
I thought he had a real soul and knew a lot about God.
There was light in his eyes of one who has conquered: sorrow in so far as sorrow is conquerable or worth; conquering.
Anyway he is the only Chicago citizen I was jealous of: that day.
He played a dance they play in some parts of Italy: when the harvest of grapes is over and the wine; presses are ready for work.; Carl Sandburg

IN A BREATH

To the Williamson Brothers

HIGH noon. White sun flashes on the Michigan Avenue

asphalt. Drum of hoofs and whirr of motors.

Women trapsing along in flimsy clothes catching

play of sun-fire to their skin and eyes.

Inside the playhouse are movies from under the sea.

From the heat of pavements and the dust of sidewalks,

passers-by go in a breath to be witnesses of

large cool sponges, large cool fishes, large cool valleys

and ridges of coral spread silent in the soak of

the ocean floor thousands of years.

A naked swimmer dives. A knife in his right hand

shoots a streak at the throat of a shark. The tail

of the shark lashes. One swing would kill the swimmer. . .

Soon the knife goes into the soft under-

neck of the veering fish. . . Its mouthful of teeth,

each tooth a dagger itself, set row on row, glistens

when the shuddering, yawning cadaver is hauled up

by the brothers of the swimmer.

Outside in the street is the murmur and singing of life

in the sun--horses, motors, women trapsing along

in flimsy clothes, play of sun-fire in their blood.

Carl Sandburg

BRONZES

I
THE bronze General Grant riding a bronze horse in Lincoln: Park
Shrivels in the sun by day when the motor cars whirr: by in long processions going somewhere to keep appointment; for dinner and matinees and buying and selling
Though in the dusk and nightfall when high waves are piling
On the slabs of the promenade along the lake shore near by
I have seen the general dare the combers come closer
And make to ride his bronze horse out into the hoofs: and guns of the storm.; II
I cross Lincoln Park on a winter night when the snow: is falling.
Lincoln in bronze stands among the white lines of snow,: his bronze forehead meeting soft echoes of the newsies; crying forty thousand men are dead along the; Yser, his bronze ears listening to the mumbled roar; of the city at his bronze feet.
A lithe Indian on a bronze pony, Shakespeare seated with: long legs in bronze, Garibaldi in a bronze cape, they; hold places in the cold, lonely snow to-night on their; pedestals and so they will hold them past midnight; and into the dawn.; Carl Sandburg

HANDFULS

FOG

THE fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.: Carl Sandburg

CHOOSE

THE single clenched fist lifted and ready,
Or the open asking hand held out and waiting.: Choose:
For we meet by one or the other.: Carl Sandburg

FLUX

SAND of the sea runs red
Where the sunset reaches and quivers.
Sand of the sea runs yellow
Where the moon slants and wavers.: Carl Sandburg

WHITE SHOULDERS

YOUR white shoulders: I remember
And your shrug of laughter.: Low laughter; Shaken slow
From your white shoulders.: Carl Sandburg

LOSSES

I HAVE love
And a child,
A banjo
And shadows.
(Losses of God,
All will go
And one day
We will hold
Only the shadows.): Carl Sandburg

TROTHS

YELLOW dust on a bumble: bee's wing,
Grey lights in a woman's: asking eyes,
Red ruins in the changing: sunset embers:
I take you and pile high: the memories.
Death will break her claws: on some I keep.; Carl Sandburg

THE ROAD AND THE END

I SHALL foot it
Down the roadway in the dusk,
Where shapes of hunger wander
And the fugitives of pain go by.
I shall foot it
In the silence of the morning,
See the night slur into dawn,
Hear the slow great winds arise
Where tall trees flank the way
And shoulder toward the sky.
The broken boulders by the road
Shall not commemorate my ruin.
Regret shall be the gravel under foot.
I shall watch for
Slim birds swift of wing
That go where wind and ranks of thunder
Drive the wild processionals of rain.
The dust of the traveled road
Shall touch my hands and face.: Carl Sandburg

WHO AM I?

MY head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of: universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I: reach my hands and play with pebbles of; destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs: reading "Keep Off."
My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive: in the universe.; Carl Sandburg

FOGS AND FIRES

AT A WINDOW

GIVE me hunger,
O you gods that sit and give
The world its orders.
Give me hunger, pain and want,
Shut me out with shame and failure
From your doors of gold and fame,
Give me your shabbiest, weariest hunger!
But leave me a little love,
A voice to speak to me in the day end,
A hand to touch me in the dark room
Breaking the long loneliness.
In the dusk of day-shapes
Blurring the sunset,
One little wandering, western star
Thrust out from the changing shores of shadow.
Let me go to the window,
Watch there the day-shapes of dusk
And wait and know the coming
Of a little love.: Carl Sandburg

UNDER THE HARVEST MOON

UNDER the harvest moon,
When the soft silver
Drips shimmering
Over the garden nights,
Death, the gray mocker,
Comes and whispers to you
As a beautiful friend
Who remembers.: Under the summer roses
When the flagrant crimson
Lurks in the dusk
Of the wild red leaves,
Love, with little hands,
Comes and touches you
With a thousand memories,
And asks you
Beautiful, unanswerable questions.: Carl Sandburg

MONOTONE

THE monotone of the rain is beautiful,
And the sudden rise and slow relapse
Of the long multitudinous rain.: The sun on the hills is beautiful,
Or a captured sunset sea-flung,
Bannered with fire and gold.: A face I know is beautiful--
With fire and gold of sky and sea,
And the peace of long warm rain.: Carl Sandburg

JOY

LET a joy keep you.
Reach out your hands
And take it when it runs by,
As the Apache dancer
Clutches his woman.
I have seen them
Live long and laugh loud,
Sent on singing, singing,
Smashed to the heart
Under the ribs
With a terrible love.
Joy always,
Joy everywhere--
Let joy kill you!
Keep away from the little deaths.: Carl Sandburg

I SANG

I SANG to you and the moon
But only the moon remembers.: I sang
O reckless free-hearted: free-throated rythms,
Even the moon remembers them: And is kind to me.; Carl Sandburg

JUNE

PAULA is digging and shaping the loam of a salvia,: Scarlet Chinese talker of summer.
Two petals of crabapple blossom blow fallen in Paula's: hair,; And fluff of white from a cottonwood.; Carl Sandburg

BETWEEN TWO HILLS

BETWEEN two hills
The old town stands.
The houses loom
And the roofs and trees
And the dusk and the dark,
The damp and the dew: Are there.
The prayers are said
And the people rest
For sleep is there
And the touch of dreams: Is over all.; Carl Sandburg

LAST ANSWERS

I WROTE a poem on the mist
And a woman asked me what I meant by it.
I had thought till then only of the beauty of the mist,: how pearl and gray of it mix and reel,
And change the drab shanties with lighted lamps at evening: into points of mystery quivering with color.; I answered:
The whole world was mist once long ago and some day: it will all go back to mist,
Our skulls and lungs are more water than bone and: tissue
And all poets love dust and mist because all the last: answers
Go running back to dust and mist.: Carl Sandburg

YOUNG SEA

THE sea is never still.
It pounds on the shore
Restless as a young heart,
Hunting.
The sea speaks
And only the stormy hearts
Know what it says:
It is the face: of a rough mother speaking.
The sea is young.
One storm cleans all the hoar
And loosens the age of it.
I hear it laughing, reckless.
They love the sea,
Men who ride on it
And know they will die
Under the salt of it
Let only the young come,: Says the sea.
Let them kiss my face: And hear me.
I am the last word: And I tell
Where storms and stars come from.: Carl Sandburg

OTHER DAYS

FROM THE SHORE

A LONE gray bird,
Dim-dipping, far-flying,
Alone in the shadows and grandeurs and tumults
Of night and the sea
And the stars and storms.
Out over the darkness it wavers and hovers,
Out into the gloom it swings and batters,
Out into the wind and the rain and the vast,
Out into the pit of a great black world,
Where fogs are at battle, sky-driven, sea-blown,
Love of mist and rapture of flight,
Glories of chance and hazards of death
On its eager and palpitant wings.
Out into the deep of the great dark world,
Beyond the long borders where foam and drift
Of the sundering waves are lost and gone
On the tides that plunge and rear and crumble.: Carl Sandburg

UNDER A TELEPHONE POLE

I AM a copper wire slung in the air,
Slim against the sun I make not even a clear line of shadow.
Night and day I keep singing--humming and thrumming:
It is love and war and money; it is the fighting and the: tears, the work and want,
Death and laughter of men and women passing through: me, carrier of your speech,
In the rain and the wet dripping, in the dawn and the: shine drying,; A copper wire.; Carl Sandburg

LANGUAGES

THERE are no handles upon a language
Whereby men take hold of it
And mark it with signs for its remembrance.
It is a river, this language,
Once in a thousand years
Breaking a new course
Changing its way to the ocean.
It is mountain effluvia
Moving to valleys
And from nation to nation
Crossing borders and mixing.
Languages die like rivers.
Words wrapped round your tongue today
And broken to shape of thought
Between your teeth and lips speaking
Now and today
Shall be faded hieroglyphics
Ten thousand years from now.
Sing--and singing--remember
Your song dies and changes
And is not here to-morrow
Any more than the wind
Blowing ten thousand years ago.: Carl Sandburg

THE MIST

I AM the mist, the impalpable mist,
Back of the thing you seek.
My arms are long,
Long as the reach of time and space.
Some toil and toil, believing,
Looking now and again on my face,
Catching a vital, olden glory.
But no one passes me,
I tangle and snare them all.
I am the cause of the Sphinx,
The voiceless, baffled, patient Sphinx.
I was at the first of things,
I will be at the last.: I am the primal mist; And no man passes me;; My long impalpable arms; Bar them all.; Carl Sandburg

GYPSY

I ASKED a gypsy pal
To imitate an old image
And speak old wisdom.
She drew in her chin,
Made her neck and head
The top piece of a Nile obelisk: and said:
Snatch off the gag from thy mouth, child,
And be free to keep silence.
Tell no man anything for no man listens,
Yet hold thy lips ready to speak.: Carl Sandburg