All about Walt Whitman

5 CONCLUSION (Part 17)

Now we give a quotation from part 1 of “A Broadway Pageant,” which is a poem to celebrate the parade down Broadway of the Japanese embassy in 1860, and to sing freedom and democracy in America. We have chosen this passage to show the beauty of these long lines (from part 1) that beat like a long and free percussion of the drums in a parade, and its mixing with the beating of the feet on the street and the voices from the crowds:

.

WHITMAN:

When million-footed Manhattan unpent descends to her pavements,
When the thunder-cracking guns arouse me with the proud roar I love,
When the round-mouth’d guns out of the smoke and smell I love spit their          salutes,
When the fire-flashing guns have fully alerted me, and heaven-clouds     canopy my city with a delicate thin haze,
When gorgeous the countless straight stems, the forests at the wharves,    thicken with colors,
When every ship richly drest carries her flag at the peak,
When pennants trail and street-festoons hang from the windows,
When Broadway is entirely given up to foot-passengers and foot-standers,          when the mass is densest,
When the façades of the houses are alive with people, when eyes gaze    riveted tens of thousands at a time,
When the guests from the islands advance, when the pageant moves        forward visible,
When the summons is made, when the answer that waited thousands of years answers,
I too arising, answering, descend to the pavements, merge with the crowd,          and gaze with them.
.

OUR RE-CREATION:

Quando a multitudinária Manhattan descerrada desce para suas calçadas,

Quando as armas de estrondeante estampido me despertam com o orgulhoso rugido que amo,

Quando as armas de bocas arredondadas cospem suas salvas, em meio à fumaça e cheiro que amo,

Quando as armas de fogo reluzentes me alertaram totalmente, e nuvens do céu dosselam minha cidade com uma tênue névoa delicada,

Quando os incontáveis troncos retos magníficos, as florestas no cais, se adensam de cores,

Quando todo navio ricamente trajado carrega sua bandeira no topo,

Quando pendões avançam e grinaldas de rua pendem das janelas,

Quando a Broadway está inteiramente sucumbida a pedestres e espectadores, quando a massa é a mais densa,

Quando as fachadas das casas estão fervilhando de pessoas, quando olhos fitam fixos dezenas de milhares de cada vez,

Quando os convidados das ilhas avançam, quando o desfile progride visível,

Quando a convocação é feita, quando a resposta que esperou milhares de anos responde,

Eu também me erguendo, respondendo, desço à calçada, fundo-me com a multidão, e fito com eles.

***