Free Honey and Salt by Carl Sandburg Page B

branches of spring
    and the surprise of blossoms:
    they too hope for a good year.
    Â 
    Search the first winter snowstorm
    for a symphonic arrangement:
    it is always there.
    Â 
    Take an alphabet of gold or mud and spell
    as you wish any words: kiss me, kill me,
    love, hate, ice, thought, victory.
    Â 
    Read the numbers on your wrist watch
    and ask: is being born, being loved,
    being dead, nothing but numbers?

Biography
    A biography, sirs, should begin—with the breath of a
    Â                                                   man
    when his eyes first meet the light of day—then working
    Â                                                   on
    through to the death when the light of day is gone:
    so the biography then is finished—unless you reverse
    Â                                                   the order
    and begin with the death and work back to the birth—
    starting the life with a coffin, moving back to a cradle—
    in which case, sirs, the biography has arrived, is
    Â                                                   completed
    when you have your subject born, except for ancestry,
    Â                                                   lineage,
    forbears, pedigree, blood, breed, bones, backgrounds—
    and these, sirs, may be carried far.

Anecdote of Hemlock for Two Athenians
    The grizzled Athenian ordered to hemlock,
    Ordered to a drink and lights out,
    Had a friend he never refused anything.
    Â 
    â€œLet me drink too,” the friend said.
    And the grizzled Athenian answered,
    â€œI never yet refused you anything.”
    Â 
    â€œI am short of hemlock enough for two,”
    The head executioner interjected,
    â€œThere must be more silver for more hemlock.”
    Â 
    â€œSomebody pay this man for the drinks of death.”
    The grizzled Athenian told his friends.
    Who fished out the ready cash wanted.
    Â 
    â€œSince one cannot die on free cost at Athens,
    Give this man his money,” were the words
    Of the man named Phocion, the grizzled Athenian.
    Â 
    Yes, there are men who know how to die in a grand way.
    There are men who make their finish worth mentioning.

Dreaming Fool
    I was the first of the fools
    (So I dreamed)
    And all the fools of the world
were put into me and I was
the biggest fool of all.
    Â 
    Others were fools in the morning
    Or in the evening or on Saturdays
    Or odd days like Friday the Thirteenth
    But me—I was a fool every day in the week
    And when asleep I was the sleeping fool.
    (So I dreamed.)

Lief the Lucky
Lief Ericson crossed the sea
to get away from a woman—
did he?
    Â 
    I have looked deep into the cisterns of the stars—
said Lief—and the stars too, every one was a struggler.
    Â 
    My neck shall not be broken without a little battle—
said Lief—and I shall always sing a little in tough weather.
    Â 
    I hunted alligators on the moon and they had excellent teeth for grinding even as the camels had excellent humps for humping—so ran one of his dreams.
    Â 
    He told the crew of a souse who said, Get me drunk and have some fun with me—and his mood changed and he told them it would be grand to travel the sky in a chariot of fire like Elijah.
    Â 
    He saw a soft milk white horse on the, top cone of an iceberg looking for a place to slide down to pearl purple sea foam—and he murmured, “I’ve been lonely too, though never so lonely one wind wouldn’t take me home to the four winds.”
    Â 
    He went on murmuring, “Never have I known time to fail me, time with its monotonous mumbling in the masts and