| Carl Sandburg (1878–1967). Smoke and Steel. 1922. |
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| V. Mist Forms |
| 35. Sandhill People |
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| I TOOK away three pictures. | |
| One was a white gull forming a half-mile arch from the pines toward Waukegan. | |
| One was a whistle in the little sandhills, a bird crying either to the sunset gone or the dusk come. | |
| One was three spotted waterbirds, zigzagging, cutting scrolls and jags, writing a bird Sanscrit of wing points, half over the sand, half over the water, a half-love for the sea, a half-love for the land. | |
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| I took away three thoughts. | 5 |
| One was a thing my people call “love,” a shut-in river hunting the sea, breaking white falls between tall clefs of hill country. | |
| One was a thing my people call “silence,” the wind running over the butter faced sand-flowers, running over the sea, and never heard of again. | |
| One was a thing my people call “death,” neither a whistle in the little sandhills, nor a bird Sanscrit of wing points, yet a coat all the stars and seas have worn, yet a face the beach wears between sunset and dusk. | |
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