Manhattan

From the place of the cornfields I went into the new places. I went into the city. How men laughed and put their hands into mine.To a high place overlooking the city I climbed. Men came running to me. On the stairways there was the endless threshing of numberless feet. The faces of women appeared. The soft lips of women were on my hands and my sinewy arms. Understanding came in to me.I am of the West, the long West of the sunsets. I am of the deep fields where the corn grows. The sweat of apples is in me. I am the beginning of things and the end of things.To me there came men whose hands were withered. My soldiers were small and their eyes were sunken. In them was the pain that sobs, the great pain that sobs. The sobbing of pain was like the threshing of feet on the stairways that went up from the city.In the morning I arose from my bed and was healed. To the cornfields I went laughing and singing. The men who are old have entered into me. As I stood on the high place above the city they kissed me. The caress of those who are weary has come into the cornfields.