What people want on the surface is often not particularly interesting... What's more telling is the congested subtext, which is what they really want underneath what they say they want... This can be both comic and tragic: You wanted love, but you got fame; you wanted fame, but you got money.
-Novel Voices, Charles Baxter
-Novel Voices, Charles Baxter
People
The sailor sails, the exile returns home,
The fugitive returns unharmed, the immigrant is back beyond months and years,
The poor Irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood
with the well-known neighbors and faces,
They warmly welcome him, he is barefoot again, he forgets he is well off,
The Dutchman voyages home, and the Scotchman and Welshman
voyage home, and the native of the Mediterranean voyages home,
To every port of England, France, Spain, enter well-filled ships,
The Swiss foots it toward his hills, the Prussian goes his way,
the Hungarian his way, and the Pole his way,
The Swede returns, and the Dane and Norwegian return.
The homeward bound and the outward bound,
The beautiful lost swimmer, the ennuye, the onanist,
the female that loves unrequited, the money-maker,
The actor and actress, those through with their parts
and those waiting to commence,
The affectionate boy, the husband and wife, the voter,
the nominee that is chosen and the nominee that has failed,
The great already known and the great any time after today,
The stammerer, the sick, the perfect-formed, the homely,
The criminal that stood in the box, the judge that sat and sentenced him,
the fluent lawyers, the jury, the audience,
The laugher and weeper, the dancer, the midnight widow, the red squaw,
The consumptive, the erysipalite, the idiot, he that is wronged,
The antipodes, and every one between this and them in the dark,
I swear they are averaged now - one is no better than the other,
The night and sleep have likened them and restored them.
I swear they are all beautiful...
-Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman
The fugitive returns unharmed, the immigrant is back beyond months and years,
The poor Irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood
with the well-known neighbors and faces,
They warmly welcome him, he is barefoot again, he forgets he is well off,
The Dutchman voyages home, and the Scotchman and Welshman
voyage home, and the native of the Mediterranean voyages home,
To every port of England, France, Spain, enter well-filled ships,
The Swiss foots it toward his hills, the Prussian goes his way,
the Hungarian his way, and the Pole his way,
The Swede returns, and the Dane and Norwegian return.
The homeward bound and the outward bound,
The beautiful lost swimmer, the ennuye, the onanist,
the female that loves unrequited, the money-maker,
The actor and actress, those through with their parts
and those waiting to commence,
The affectionate boy, the husband and wife, the voter,
the nominee that is chosen and the nominee that has failed,
The great already known and the great any time after today,
The stammerer, the sick, the perfect-formed, the homely,
The criminal that stood in the box, the judge that sat and sentenced him,
the fluent lawyers, the jury, the audience,
The laugher and weeper, the dancer, the midnight widow, the red squaw,
The consumptive, the erysipalite, the idiot, he that is wronged,
The antipodes, and every one between this and them in the dark,
I swear they are averaged now - one is no better than the other,
The night and sleep have likened them and restored them.
I swear they are all beautiful...
-Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman
