From
Leaves of Grass, by
Walt Whitman:
I saw in
Louisiana a live-
oak growing,
All alone stood it and the
moss hung down from the branches,
Without any
companion it grew there uttering joyous leaves
of dark
green,
And its look, rude, unbending,
lusty, made me think of
myself,
But I wonder'd how it could utter joyous leaves standing
alone there without its friend near, for I knew I could not,
And I broke off a
twig with a certain number of leaves upon
it, and twined around it a little moss,
And brought it away, and I have placed it in sight, in my room,
It is not needed to remind me as of my own dear friends,
(For I
believe lately I think of little else than of them,)
Yet it remains to me a curious
token, it makes me think of
manly love;
For all that, and though the live-oak glistens there in
Louisiana
solitary in a wide flat space,
Uttering joyous leaves all its life without a friend a lover near,
I know very well I could not.