ONE hour to madness and joy! <br /> O furious! O confine me not! <br /> (What is this that frees me so in storms? <br /> What do my shouts amid lightnings and raging winds mean?) <br /> <br /> O to drink the mystic deliria deeper than any other man! <br /> O savage and tender achings! <br /> (I bequeath them to you, my children, <br /> I tell them to you, for reasons, O bridegroom and bride.) <br /> <br /> O to be yielded to you, whoever you are, and you to be yielded to me, <br /> in defiance of the world! <br /> O to return to Paradise! O bashful and feminine! 10 <br /> O to draw you to me--to plant on you for the first time the lips of a <br /> determin'd man! <br /> <br /> O the puzzle--the thrice-tied knot--the deep and dark pool! O all <br /> untied and illumin'd! <br /> O to speed where there is space enough and air enough at last! <br /> O to be absolv'd from previous ties and conventions--I from mine, and <br /> you from yours! <br /> O to find a new unthought-of nonchalance with the best of nature! <br /> O to have the gag remov'd from one's mouth! <br /> O to have the feeling, to-day or any day, I am sufficient as I am! <br /> <br /> O something unprov'd! something in a trance! <br /> O madness amorous! O trembling! <br /> O to escape utterly from others' anchors and holds! 20 <br /> To drive free! to love free! to dash reckless and dangerous! <br /> To court destruction with taunts--with invitations! <br /> To ascend--to leap to the heavens of the love indicated to me! <br /> To rise thither with my inebriate Soul! <br /> To be lost, if it must be so! <br /> To feed the remainder of life with one hour of fulness and freedom! <br /> With one brief hour of madness and joy.<br /><br />Walt Whitman<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/one-hour-to-madness-and-joy/
