The New Anthology
ofAmerican Poetry
VOLUME ONE
Traditions and Revolutions,
Beginnings to 1900
EDITED BY
Steven Gould Axelrod
Camille Roman
Thomas Travisano
RUTGERS UNIVERSITY PRESS
NEW BRUNSWICK, NEW JERSEY, AND LONDON
CONTENTS
Preface
Acknowledgments
.
.
.
xxv
xxix
. -
PART ONE: PRE-COLUMBIAN PERIOD TO 1800
Introduction
3
NATIVE-AMERICAN SONGS, RITUAL POETRY,
AND LYRIC POETRY (Pre-1492-1800)
5
The Tree of the Great Peace [IROQUOIS] 6
Sayatasha's Night Chant [ZUNI] 7
Song[COPPER ESKIMO]
27
Love Song [ALEUT] 28
Song of Repulse to a Vain Lover [MAKAH]
To'ak 28
Formula to Secure Love [CHEROKEE] 28
Formula to Cause Death [CHEROKEE] A'yunini, or the Swimmer 29
Woman's Song [CHIPPEWA] 30
SongofWar [CHIPPEWA]
Odjib'we
31
Song for Bringing a Child into the World [SEMINOLE] 31
Song for the Dying [SEMINOLE] 31
GASPAR PEREZ DE VILLAGRA ( 1 5 5 5 - 1 6 2 0 )
32
FROM Historia de la Nueva Mexico/The History of New Mexico
Canto Primero/Canto 1 33
ANNE BRADSTREET (ca. 1612-1672)
The Prologue 43
An Epitaph on My Dear and Ever Honored Mother 45
The Author to Her Book 46
42
•
Contents
Contemplations 47
The Flesh and the Spirit 55
To Her Father with Some Verses 58
To My Dear and Loving Husband 58
A Letter to Her Husband, Absent upon Public Employment
59
Before the Birth of One of Her Children 60
In Reference to Her Children 60
For Deliverance from a Fever 63
In Memory of My Dear Grandchild Elizabeth Bradstreet 64
Verses upon the Burning of Our House 64
As Weary Pilgrim 66
MICHAEL WIGGLESWORTH (1631-1705)
FROM
67
Tne Day of Doom 68
EDWARD TAYLOR (ca. 1642-1729)
75
FROM Preparatory Meditations
Prologue 77
Meditation 8 (First Series) 78
Meditation 16 (First Series) 79
Meditation 22 (First Series) 81
Meditation 39 (First Series) 82
Meditation 42 (First Series) 84
Meditation 150 (Second Series) 85
FROM God's Determinations
The Preface 86
FROM Miscellaneous Poems
• Upon a Spider Catching a Fly 87
Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold 89
Huswifery 90
Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children 91
LUCY TERRY (ca. 1 7 3 0 - 1 8 2 1 )
Bars Fight 94
93
Contents
PHILIP FRENEAU ( 1 7 5 2 - 1 8 3 2 )
*
95
To Sir Toby 97
On the Emigration to America and Peopling the Western Country
99
The Wild Honey Suckle 100
The Indian Burying Ground 101
On Mr. Paine's Rights of Man
103
PHILLIS WHEATLEY (ca. 1753-1784)
104
On Being Brought from Africa to America 106
To the University of Cambridge, in New England
107
On the Death of the Rev. Mr. George Whitefield, lyyo
On Imagination
108
109
To the Right Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth
111
To S.M.,a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works 113
To His Excellency General Washington 114
JOEL BARLOW ( 1 7 5 4 - 1 8 1 2 )
115
FROM The Hasty Pudding
Canto l 116
SONGS OF THE A M E R I C A N R E V O L U T I O N A N D N E W N A T I O N
.
.
.
PATRIOT LYRICS
The Liberty Song 122
Chester 123
Alphabet
124
The King's own Regulars; And their Triumphs over the Irregulars 125
The Irishman's Epistle to the Officers and Troops at Boston 127
The Yankee's Return from Camp
128
The Public Spirit of the Women 130
AToast to Washington
Adams and Liberty
Francis Hopkinson
Thomas Paine 131
130
. 1 2 1
•
Contents
LOYALIST LYRICS
When Good Queen Elizabeth Governed the Realm 132
Song for a Fishing Party 133
Burrowing Yankees 134
A Refugee Song 134
PART TWO: EARLY TO MID-NINETEENTH CENTURY
Introduction 139
AFRICAN-AMERICAN SLAVE SONGS (1800-1863)
141
Go Down, Moses 142
Many Thousand Gone 143
Michael Row the Boat Ashore 144
Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Had 145
Roll, Jordan, Roll 146
There's a Meeting Here To-Night 146
NATIVE-AMERICAN SONGS, RITUAL POETRY,
AND LYRIC POETRY (1800-1900)
147
FROM The Mountain Chant [NAVAJO]
One of the Awl Songs 148
Last Song of the Exploding Stick 149
FROM The Night Chant [NAVAJO]
Song in the Rock 149
Last Song in the Rock 150
Prayer of First Dancers 150
Songof t he Earth [NAVAJO] 153
The Dancing Speech of O-No'-Sa [IROQUOIS] 155
SIX DREAM SONGS
You and I Shall Go [WINTU]
Minnows and Flowers
Sleep [WINTU]
155
[WINTU]
156
Dandelion Puffs [WINTU] 156
There Above [WINTU] 156
Strange Flowers
[WINTU]
157
155
Contents
•
GHOST DANCE SONGS
[The Father Says So] [sioux]
157
[Give Me Back My Bow] [sioux]
157
[The Whole World Is Coming] [sioux]
158
LYDIA HOWARD HUNTLEY SIGOURNEY ( 1 7 9 1 - 1 8 6 5 )
The Suttee
159
159
Indian Names 161
WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT (1794-1878)
162
Thanatopsis 164
To a Waterfowl 166
An Indian Story 167
A Scene on the Banks of the Hudson
Hymn of the City
170
171
The Death of Lincoln
172
GEORGE MOSES HORTON (ca. 1797-1883)
173
On Liberty and Slavery 173
JANE JOHNSTON SCHOOLCRAFT [BAME-WA-WA-GE-ZHIK-A-QUAY,
WOMAN OF THE STARS RUSHING THROUGH THE SKY] (1800-1841)
.
.
. 175
To Sisters on a Walk in the Garden, after a Shower 176
The Forsaken Brother, a Chippewa Tale
Neesya, neesya, shyegwuh gushuh/My brother, my brother
FROM
SARAH HELEN WHITMAN (1803-1878)
176
177
The Raven 179
FROM Sonnets [to Poe]
To
181
182
RALPH WALDO EMERSON (1803-1882)
Concord Hymn
Each and All
185
185
The Rhodora 187
The Snow-Storm 187
182
xi
xii
• Contents
TheHumble-Bee 188
Hamatreya 191
Merlin 193
Ode, Inscribed to W. H. Channing
Days 200
196
Brahma 200
FROM Voluntaries 201
PROSE
The Poef
202
Letter to Walt Whitman
219
ELIZABETH OAKES SMITH (1806-1893)
220
The Unattained 221
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW (1807-1882)
221
A Psalm of Life 226
Hymn to the Night 227
The Wreck of the Hesperus 228
Mezzo Cammin 231
The Day Is Done 232
The Bridge 233
FROM Evangeline
[Prologue] 235
My Lost Youth 236
The Jewish Cemetery at Newport 238
FROM The Song of Hiawatha
V. Hiawatha's Fasting 241
XIV. Picture-Writing 248
The Landlord's Tale: Paul Revere's Ride 253
Aftermath 256
Milton 257
Nature 257
The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls 258
The Cross of Snow 258
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER (1807-1892)
Massachusetts to Virginia 261
Ichabodl 265
259
Contents *
Skipper Ireson's Ride 266
Telling the Bees 270
Snow-Bound 272
EDGAR ALLAN POE (1809-1849)
294
[Alone] 298
Sonnet—To Science 299
Romance 299
To Helen 300
Israfel 301
The City in the Sea 302
The Haunted Palace 304
The Raven 305
Ulalume 309
Eldorado 312
To Helen 313
To My Mother 315
The Be//s 315
Annabel Lee 318
PROSE
The Philosophy of Composition
320
OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES (1809-1894)
329
Old Ironsides 330
The Chambered Nautilus 331
The Deacon's Masterpiece, or The Wonderful One-Hoss Shay
The Flaneur 337
ABRAHAM LINCOLN (1809-1865)
My Childhood Home I See Again
341
343
MARGARET FULLER (1810-1850)
Meditations
333
346
347
FRANCES SARGENT LOCKE OSGOOD (1811-1850)
The Maiden's Mistake 351
The Wraith of the Rose 352
Lines 353
The Hand That Swept the Sounding Lyre 354
350
•
Contents
ADA [SARAH LOUISA FORTEN] (ca. 1814-1898)
355
The Slave Girl's Farewell 356
The Slave 357
HENRY DAVID THOREAU ( 1 8 1 7 - 1 8 6 2 )
Sic Vita
Haze
358
359
361
Smoke
361
My life has been the poem I would have writ 362
Mist
362
Between the traveller and the setting sun
362
JULIA WARD HOWE (1819-1910)
Battle Hymn of the Republic
363
364
HERMAN MELVILLE ( 1 8 1 9 - 1 8 9 1 )
365
FROM Battle-Piecesand Aspects of the War
The Portent 367
The March into Virginia
Shiloh
368
369
A Utilitarian View of the Monitor's Fight
370
The House-Top 371
The College Colonel 372
The Apparition
373
OTHER POEMS
The Maldive Shark
Art
374
374
Monody
375
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL ( 1 8 1 9 - 1 8 9 1 )
FROM A Fable for Critics
Ralph Waldo Emerson 377
Edgar Allan Poe 379
James Russell Lowell 379
376
Contents
WALT WHITMAN (1819-1892)
Song of Myself
•
380
384
There Was a Child Went Forth 432
Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking 434
As I Ebb'd with the Ocean of Life 439
I Sit and Look Out
Native Moments
441
442
Once I Pass'd through a Populous City
442
Facing West from California s Shores 443
As Adam Early in the Morning
443
In Paths Untrodden 443
Hours Continuing Long
444
Trickle Drops 445
City of Orgies 445
Behold This Swarthy Face 445
I Saw in Louisiana a Live-Oak Growing 446
Here the Frailest Leaves of Me
446
A Hand-Mirror 446
When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer 447
Cavalry Crossing a Ford 447
The Wound-Dresser 448
Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night
450
Bivouac on a Mountain Side 451
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd 451
Reconciliation 458
One's-Self I Sing
458
A Noiseless Patient Spider 459
Passage to India
459
The Dalliance of the Eagles 468
Good-Bye My Fancy! 468
ALICE CARY (1820-1871)
The Sea-Side Cave 470
Contradiction 471
469
xv
•
Contents
FREDERICK GODDARD TUCKERMAN ( 1 8 2 1 - 1 8 7 3 )
471
Sonnets 472
The Cricket 473
PHOEBE CARY ( 1 8 2 4 - 1 8 7 1 )
477
Dorothy's Dower 478
Samuel Brown
FRANCES ELLEN WATKINS HARPER ( 1 8 2 5 - 1 9 1 1 )
The Slave Mother
481
484
Bible Defence of Slavery 485
The Slave Auction
486
Lines 487
The Slave Mother, a Tale of the Ohio
Bury Me in a Free Land
488
490
Aunt Chloe's Politics 492
Learning to Read 492
Church Building
494
A Double Standard
495
MARIA WHITE LOWELL (1827-1853)
Africa
497
498
The Sick-Room 501
An Opium Fantasy 502
ROSE TERRY COOKE (1827-1892)
Captive
505
Blue-Beard's Closet 506
"Che Sara Sara" 507
Semele
508
A Hospital Soliloquy
509
Schemhammphorasch 511
Arachne 514
R. W. Emerson 515
504
Contents * xvii
JOHN ROLLIN RIDGE (1827-1867)
516
The Stolen White Girl 517
HENRY TIMROD (1828-1867)
518
Ode 518
HAWAIIAN PLANTATION WORK SONGS (1825-1930)
519
Uya AnmalMy Mother Dear Nae Nakasone 521
Hana-Hana: Working 521
The Five O 'Clock Whistle! 522
Hole Hole Bushi/Stripping Leaves from Sugarcane 523
JINSHAN GE/SONGS OF GOLD MOUNTAIN (1838-1920)
[Jinshan Fu Xing]/Song of the Wife of a Gold Mountain Man
523
524
POPULAR EUROPEAN-AMERICAN SONGS
On Top of Old Smoky
524
525
Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie 526
Clementine
Aura Lee
527
528
The Battle Cry of Freedom 528
Tenting on the Old Camp Ground
529
When Johnny Comes Marching Home
530
Come Home, Father Henry Clay Work 530
I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen
FROM America, the Beautiful
531
Katherine Lee Bates 532
PART THREE: LATER NINETEENTH CENTURY
Introduction
535
CORRIDOS (1860s-1930s)
537
Kiansis I/Kansas 1 538
ZARAGOZA CLUBS (1860s)
Mejico libre ha de ser/Mexico will be free Merced J. de Gonzales
En la antigua Roma habialln ancient Rome there stood
Filomena Ibarra 541
540
540
•
Contents
DEWITT CLINTON D U N C A N [TOO-QUA-STEE] ( 1 8 2 9 - 1 9 0 9 )
The Dead Nation
.
.
.
. 5 4 2
544
HELEN HUNT JACKSON (1830-1885)
545
Found Frozen 546
Danger 546
Cheyenne Mountain
547
EMILY DICKINSON (1830-1886)
548
I never lost as much but twice
552
Success is counted sweetest
552
These are the days when birds come hack
The daisy follows soft the sun
Title divine is mine!
553
554
"Faith" is a fine invention
554
I taste a liquor never brewed
We dont cry - Tim and I
555
555
I'm nobody! Who are you?
556
Wild nights - Wild nights!
557
There's a certain slant of light
I felt a funeral in my brain
557
558
I'm ceded - I've stopped being theirs
It was not death, for I stood up
A bird came down the walk
559
559
560
The soul has bandaged moments
561
After great pain a formal feeling comes
This world is not conclusion
The soul selects her own society
564
I had been hungry all the years
564
They shut me up in prose
565
565
I died for beauty but was scarce
I dwell in possibility
562
562
One need not be a chamber to be haunted
TTiz's was a poet
553
566
566
I was the slightest in the house
567
563
Contents
Because I could not stop for death
567
A still volcano life 568
This is my letter to the world 569
For largest woman's heart I knew
I heard a fly buzz when I died
The brain is wider than the sky
569
569
570
Much madness is divinest sense 570
I've seen a dying eye 571
I started early - took my dog 571
I cannot live with you
572
Pain has an element of blank
574
My life had stood a loaded gun
Publication is the auction
574
575
Thfs consciousness that is aware 575
Color - caste - denomination
576
She rose to his requirement - dropt 577
Under the light yet under $J-J
A narrow fellow in the grass 578
The bustle in a house 578
Tell all the truth but tell it slant
579
What mystery pervades a well! 579
Volcanoes be in Sicily
580
My life closed twice before it's close 580
LETTERS
To Susan Gilbert (Dickinson) (June 2-7,1852) 581
To Samuel Bowles (About February 1861) 582
To recipient unknown (About 1861) 582
To Thomas Wentworth Higginson (April 15,1862)
584
To Thomas Wentworth Higginson (April 25,1862) 585
To Thomas Wentworth Higginson (June 7,1862)
586
To Thomas Wentworth Higginson (July 1862) 587
To Otis P. Lord (About 1878) 588
To Susan Gilbert Dickinson (About 1884)
588
•
Contents
ADAH ISAACS MENKEN (ca. 1835-1868)
Myself
591
A Memory
Infelix
589
593
594
SARAH M.B. PIATT (1836-1919)
595
Giving Back the Flower 597
Shapes of a Soul
598
A Hundred Years Ago
599
The Palace-Burner 600
Her Blindness in Grief 601
We Two
603
The Witch in the Glass 604
LYDIA K A M A K A E H A [QUEEN L I L I ' U O K A L A N I ] ( 1 8 3 8 - 1 9 1 7 )
Aloha ^Oe/Farewell to Thee
.
.
. . 6 0 5
606
Ku \i Pua I Paoa-ka-lani/My Flower at Paoa-ka-lani 607
Sanoe/Sanoe
608
INACOOLBRITH (1841-1928)
610
The Mariposa Lily 611
The Sea-Shell 612
The Captive of the White City
612
Sailed 615
Woman 615
SIDNEY LANIER (1842-1881)
The Marshes of Glynn
617
618
EMMA LAZARUS (1849-1887)
Long Island Sound
The Cranes oflbycus
The South
624
Echoes 626
City Visions 627
In Exile 628
623
624
621
Contents •
The New Colossus 629
1492 630
Venus of the Louvre 630
SARAH ORNEJEWETT (1849-1909)
631
A Caged Bird 632
ALBERYALLSON WHITMAN (1851-1901)
FROM The Octoroon
633
635
EDWIN MARKHAM (1852-1940)
646
The Man with the Hoe 647
Preparedness 649
Outwitted 649
JOSE MARTi (1853-1895)
649
FROM Versos sencillos/Simple Verses 650
ERNEST FRANCISCO FENOLLOSA (1853-1908)
656
The Wood Dove 658
Fuji at Sunrise 659
LOUISE IMOGEN GUINEY (1861-1920)
659
Tarpeia 660
Planting the Poplar 662
MARY MCNEIL FENOLLOSA (1865-1954)
663
Miyoko San 664
Yuki 665
OWL WOMAN [JUANA MANWELL] (1867-1957)
666
FROM So?igs for Treating Sickness, Parts One and Two 667
SADAKICHI HARTMANN (1867-1944)
Cyanogen Seas Are Surging 671
FROM My Rubaiyat
Tanka 674
FROM Haikai
676
672
669
•
Contents
EDGAR LEE MASTERS (1868-1950)
676
FROM Spoon River Anthology
The Unknown
677
Elsa Wertman
678
Hamilton Greene 679
W.E.B. DU BOIS (1868-1963)
A Litany of Atlanta
679
680
My Country 'Tis of Thee 683
The Quadroon
684
WILLIAM VAUGHN MOODY (1869-1910)
685
The Bracelet of Grass 685
An Ode in Time of Hesitation
686
EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON (1869-1935)
The House on the Hill
693
695
The Children of the Night
696
John Evereldown 697
Luke Havergal 698
Richard Cory
699
Calverly's 700
Miniver Cheevy
701
Eros Turannos 702
The Mill
703
Mr. Flood's Party 704
STEPHEN CRANE (1871-1900)
706
FROM The Black Riders and Other Lines
1 ("Black riders came from the sea")
3 ("In the desert")
707
9 ("I stood upon a high place")
19 ("A god in wrath")
707
708
708
24 ("I saw a man pursuing the horizon")
27 ("A youth in apparel that glittered")
708
709
46 ("Many red devils ran from my heart")
709
56 ("A man feared that he might find an assassin")
710
Contents
FROM
*
War is Kind
76 ("Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind")
96 ("A man said to the universe")
710
711
POSTHUMOUSLY PUBLISHED POEMS
113 ("A man adrift on a slim spar") 711
JAMESWELDON JOHNSON (1871-1938)
712
O Black and Unknown Bards 713
My City
714
PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR (1872-1906)
Accountability
715
718
The Mystery 719
A Summer's Night
719
We Wear the Mask
720
When Malindy Sings
Dawn
720
723
Sympathy
723
The Poet 724
Douglass 724
The Debt
725
The Haunted Oak
To Alice Dunbar
Compensation
About the Editors
Index
725
727
728
729
731
xxiii