All the outdoors the child heart knows, The apple allied to the thorn, Child of the rose. Porches untrod of forest houses. All before him, all day long, "Yankee Doodle" his marching song; And the evening breeze Joined his psalms of praise As he sang the ways Of the Ancient of Days. Leaving behind august Virginia, Proud Massachusetts, and proud Maine, Like Birnam wood to Dunsinane, Johnny Appleseed swept on, Every shackle gone, Loving every sloshy brake, Loving every skunk and snake, Loving every leathery weed, Johnny Appleseed, Johnny Appleseed, Master and ruler of the unicorn-ramping forest, The tiger-mewing forest, The rooster-trumpeting, boar-foaming, wolf-ravening forest, Stupendous and endless, Searching its perilous ways In the name of the Ancient of Days. II. THE INDIANS WORSHIP HIM, BUT HE HURRIES ON Painted kings in the midst of the clearings To guard each planted seed and seedling. Then he was a god, to the red man's dreaming; Then the chiefs brought treasures grotesque and fair,- Beads and furs from their medicine-lair,- Hailed him with austere delight. The orchard god was their guest through the night. While the late snow blew from bleak Lake Erie, All night long they made great medicine For Jonathan Chapman, Johnny Appleseed, Johnny Appleseed; And as though his heart were a wind-blown wheat-sheaf, As though his heart were a new-built nest, As though their heaven house were his breast, In swept the snow-birds singing glory. And I hear his bird heart beat its story, And the timid wings of the bird-ghosts beating, But he left their wigwams and their love. Went forth to live on roots and bark, Sleep in the trees, while the years howled by. Calling the catamounts by name, And buffalo bulls no hand could tame, Slaying never a living creature, Joining the birds in every game, With the gorgeous turkey gobblers mocking, With the lean-necked eagles boxing and shouting; Sticking their feathers in his hair, Turkey feathers, Eagle feathers, Trading hearts with the whole young earth, Bare-armed, barefooted, and bare-breasted. The maples, shedding their spinning seeds, And the foxes danced the Virginia reel; Hawthorne and crab-thorn bent, rain-wet, And he ran with the rabbit and slept with the stream. III. JOHNNY APPLESEED'S Old Age Long, long after, When settlers put up beam and rafter, But the robin might have said, "To the farthest West he has followed the sun, Self-scourged, like a monk, with a throne for wages, Draped like a statue, in strings like a scarecrow, His helmet-hat an old tin pan, But worn in the love of the heart of man, More sane than the helm of Tamerlane, Hairy Ainu, wild man of Borneo, Robinson Crusoe-Johnny Appleseed; And the robin might have said, "Sowing, he goes to the far, new West, With the apple, the sun of his burning breast The apple allied to the thorn, Child of the rose." Washington buried in Virginia, Jackson buried in Tennessee, Young Lincoln, dreaming in Illinois, And Johnny Appleseed, priestly and free, Knotted and gnarled, past seventy years, Still planted on in the woods alone. Ohio and young Indiana— These were his wide altar-stone, Where still he burnt out flesh and bone. Twenty days ahead of the Indian, twenty years ahead of the white man, At last the Indian overtook him, at last the Indian hurried past him; At last the white man overtook him, at last the white man hurried past him; At last his own trees overtook him, at last his own trees hurried past him. Many cats were tame again, Many ponies tame again, Many canaries tame again; And the real frontier was his sun-burnt breast. From the fiery core of that apple, the earth, Sprang apple-amaranths divine. Love's orchards climbed to the heavens of the West, Farm hands from the terraces of the blest Lifted his hands to the farm-filled sky, Then The sun was their turned-up barrel, Down the repeated terraces, Thumping across the gold, A presence in each apple that touched the forest mold, A ballot-box in each apple, A state capital in each apple, Great high schools, great colleges, All America in each apple, Each red, rich, round, and bouncing moon Like scrolls and rolled-up flags of silk, He saw the fruits unfold, All color and all glory in one wild-flower-tangled dream, And the dew on the grass and his own cold tears Though death's loud thunder came upon him, The boughs and the proud thoughts swept through the thunder, Each petal a park for holy feet, With wild fawns merry on every street, The vista of a thousand years, flower-lighted and complete. Hear the lazy weeds murmuring, bays and rivers whispering, In the four-poster bed Johnny Appleseed built, Autumn rains were the curtains, autumn leaves were the quilt. Like a bump on a log, like a stone washed white, |