Carl Sandburg

Leather Leggings

THEY have taken the ball of earth  
   and made it a little thing.  
 
They were held to the land and horses;  
   they were held to the little seas.  
They have changed and shaped and welded;    
   they have broken the old tools and made  
   new ones; they are ranging the white  
   scarves of cloudland; they are bumping  
   the sunken bells of the Carthaginians  
   and Phœnicians:      
             they are handling  
             the strongest sea  
             as a thing to be handled.  
 
The earth was a call that mocked;  
   it is belted with wires and meshed with    
   steel; from Pittsburg to Vladivostok is  
   an iron ride on a moving house; from  
   Jerusalem to Tokyo is a reckoned span;  
   and they talk at night in the storm and  
   salt, the wind and the war.    
 
They have counted the miles to the Sun  
   and Canopus; they have weighed a small  
   blue star that comes in the southeast  
   corner of the sky on a foretold errand.  
 
We shall search the sea again.        
We shall search the stars again.  
There are no bars across the way.  
There is no end to the plan and the clue,  
   the hunt and the thirst.  
The motors are drumming, the leather leggings    
   and the leather coats wait:  
                       Under the sea  
                       and out to the stars  
                       we go.
Other works by Carl Sandburg...



Top