[We are the knife people . . .]

We are the knife people, iron men, coat people and he-lands-sailing. Souse eaters, house makers, husbands of kine and goat and swine, farm builders and keepers of kettle and scummer, word scratchers, corn stealers and bad sleepers. As if towns could build themselves. As if stumps jumped from the ground or flesh of beasts fell into trenchers. As if paradise prevailed on earth. To come to rich moulds and lush plantings, long-necked trees and tongues of land, to redd the wild for the unborn. To reck not the peril. Suffering snakes that may fly, wolves that may ravish. Kingdom of sachem and sagamore. Kingdom of corn and thorny promise. To satisfy our appetite of spirit, our thirst of property. To seek not the opera of war but belittled by the possibilities to stand silenced by the task before us— these be my sudden and undigested thoughts.