Classic Poem

I too have something to say to you:
I too talk to you freely — the freest of all — now that the others are done:
And though I do not raise my voice high and make a noise and overdress my words,
And though I do not insist too much upon myself when you dont want to listen to me,
Still I push even into forbidden places and say my say in an unwavering voice,
Sure as I am that finally you will know what I come for and welcome me:
Not today, maybe, or tomorrow: not, maybe, until after many todays and tomorrows:
Not at once, maybe, but in the end, after the lesser guides have fallen short of their promises:
In the darkness, maybe: not turning to me until you have tried all the others and not got what you wanted: not until then:
Hating to do it, resenting me still, resisting to the last, yet undeniably needing me:
Calling my name in reluctant faith, holding yourself back yet summoning me —
Perhaps despising me still, perhaps making less instead of more of me still,
Yet hungry, thirsty: pressed to the verge: delaying no more — crying aloud for me:
Not knowing who I am or what I mean, yet crying for me: in wretchedness and despair invoking my aid:
You, all of you, my sisters and brothers, in whom here now as you see me I excite only laughter and scorn.

Everybody has had something to say to you — everybody has taken you in hand:
The little have had much to say to you and the big have had little to say to you:
And they have said things to you out of laws and books and the past,
And they have said things to you out of armies and navies where men are enemies and fight,
And they have said things to you out of parlors and offices and out of vast incomes,
And they have said things to you in the name of dead religions and buried humanities,
And they have said things in the script of alien arts testifying on empty sheets of paper:
Thev have said these things to you: these things and more: and yet you stand around waiting for something still unsaid:
Something, you dont know what: something not in all their glittering parade:
Something left out of the figures, left out of the great houses and affairs:
Something preciously necessary yet totally forgotten: whatever it is, it alone being real and sure:
Something answering the call of life and love: from the unfathomable deeps answering: from courage and sacrifice answering:
Something which the masters have missed — something which is nowhere in their catalogues and formulas:
Something which the body may skip and property may skip but which the soul cant skip:
Something, something, something.
Something, something, something:
I do not know: maybe I make too much of myself: maybe I dont weigh as much as I think:
But somehow it seems to be my turn now: after patiently waiting, seems to be my turn:
Now that the others are through it is about time for me to begin:
I too having something to say to you — the things maybe that you most need and have been waiting for: without knowing it, have been waiting for:
Things not out of their laws and their books and their shows and their armies:
Things not out of their fames and their flatteries and eloquent in the life of the great:
No: but things out of hearts — things out of my heart: things out of my love:
Things out of the days I have lived: things out of being a success and being a failure:
Things out of my passion and out of my stumbling efforts to see and to grow:
Such things: O dear ones: my very tissue, my very blood, my very inmost unravelings of shame:
Such things, O dear ones: pouring from me into you: sorry things, glad things, out of my faltering days:
Things made least of: things I make most of: things that are brushed aside by the elect:
These, these, I bring you, O dear ones: these you wait for: these you cry and laugh for:
These things of my body giving up life for you: these things of my soul giving up death for you:
These things coming to you after everything else has come to you,
As I coming to you come only after everyone else has come to you,
Not begging for favors, not claiming anything either, just simply placing everything I have at your feet:
Everything I have, my adored ones, you men and women who suffer:
Little though it is, just everything I have, answering your cry: everything I have:
Something, something, something.

I too have something to say to you, O dear ones: I too have something to say:
And it will be best for you to listen to me: I bring that which all the others have made of no account:
And though I do not talk in pretty phrases to suit you you will find me useful anyhow:
It is no accident when I come to you in my usual clothes and make my usual speech:
I dont want to outrage the others but I want to honor myself and you:
And so I am satisfied to be as I am even if that is to be very little indeed:
Rather that than to be as some one else is even if that is to be very big indeed:
For I have not arrived with my arms full and my heart full of nice phrases and palsying joys:
No: far from that: I come suffocated with love — with simple everyday love:
And that love I must let out — that love belongs to you and I am here to deliver it —
Though you reject me, though you destroy me, I come to deliver that love:
You will take it or not as you choose or as you must, I am here to deliver it:
To deliver it in new poems, in new scriptures and in new trades,
Putting away all the barbarisms to make room for this simple charge out of my tortured dream:
To deliver my love to you — to deliver myself: my body, my soul — to deliver them:
I too have something to say to you.