Walt Whitman - Leaves of Grass

Walt Whitman - Leaves of Grass

Inscriptions

To the States

To the States or any one of them, or any city of the States, Resist
         much, obey little,
Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved,
Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city of this earth, ever
         afterward resumes its liberty.
 

 

I Hear America Singing

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the deckhand
         singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter singing as
         he stands,
The wood-cutter's song, the ploughboy's on his way in the morning,
         or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at work,
         or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else,
The day what belongs to the day—at night the party of young
         fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.

 

 

Song of myself 

20

Who goes there? hankering, gross, mystical, nude;
How is it I extract strength from the beef I eat?
What is a man anyhow? what am I? what are you?
All I mark as my own you shall offset it with your own,
Else it were time lost listening to me.
I do not snivel that snivel the world over,
That months are vacuums and the ground but wallow and filth.
Whimpering and truckling fold with powders for invalids, conformity goes to the fourth-remov'd,
I wear my hat as I please indoors or out.
Why should I pray? why should I venerate and be ceremonious?
Having pried through the strata, analyzed to a hair, counsel'd with doctors and calculated close,
I find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.
In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barley-corn less,
And the good or bad I say of myself I say of them.
I know I am solid and sound,
To me the converging objects of the universe perpetually flow,
All are written to me, and I must get what the writing means.
I know I am deathless,
I know this orbit of mine cannot be swept by a carpenter's compass,
I know I shall not pass like a child's carlacue cut with a burnt stick at night.
I know I am august,
I do not trouble my spirit to vindicate itself or be understood,
I see that the elementary laws never apologize,
(I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house by, after all.)
I exist as I am, that is enough,
If no other in the world be aware I sit content,
And if each and all be aware I sit content.
One world is aware and by far the largest to me, and that is myself,
And whether I come to my own to-day or in ten thousand or ten million years,
I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait.
My foothold is tenon'd and mortis'd in granite,
I laugh at what you call dissolution,
And I know the amplitude of time.

 

Children of Adam

I Sing the Body Electric 9

  O my body! I dare not desert the likes of you in other men and
      women, nor the likes of the parts of you,
I believe the likes of you are to stand or fall with the likes of
      the soul, (and that they are the soul,)
I believe the likes of you shall stand or fall with my poems, and
      that they are my poems,
Man's, woman's, child, youth's, wife's, husband's, mother's,
      father's, young man's, young woman's poems,
Head, neck, hair, ears, drop and tympan of the ears,
Eyes, eye-fringes, iris of the eye, eyebrows, and the waking or
      sleeping of the lids,
Mouth, tongue, lips, teeth, roof of the mouth, jaws, and the jaw-hinges,
Nose, nostrils of the nose, and the partition,
Cheeks, temples, forehead, chin, throat, back of the neck, neck-slue,
Strong shoulders, manly beard, scapula, hind-shoulders, and the
      ample side-round of the chest,
Upper-arm, armpit, elbow-socket, lower-arm, arm-sinews, arm-bones,
Wrist and wrist-joints, hand, palm, knuckles, thumb, forefinger,
      finger-joints, finger-nails,
Broad breast-front, curling hair of the breast, breast-bone, breast-side,
Ribs, belly, backbone, joints of the backbone,
Hips, hip-sockets, hip-strength, inward and outward round,
      man-balls, man-root,
Strong set of thighs, well carrying the trunk above,
Leg-fibres, knee, knee-pan, upper-leg, under-leg,
Ankles, instep, foot-ball, toes, toe-joints, the heel;
All attitudes, all the shapeliness, all the belongings of my or your
      body or of any one's body, male or female,
The lung-sponges, the stomach-sac, the bowels sweet and clean,
The brain in its folds inside the skull-frame,
Sympathies, heart-valves, palate-valves, sexuality, maternity,
Womanhood, and all that is a woman, and the man that comes from woman,
The womb, the teats, nipples, breast-milk, tears, laughter, weeping,
      love-looks, love-perturbations and risings,
The voice, articulation, language, whispering, shouting aloud,
Food, drink, pulse, digestion, sweat, sleep, walking, swimming,
Poise on the hips, leaping, reclining, embracing, arm-curving and tightening,
The continual changes of the flex of the mouth, and around the eyes,
The skin, the sunburnt shade, freckles, hair,
The curious sympathy one feels when feeling with the hand the naked
      meat of the body,
The circling rivers the breath, and breathing it in and out,
The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and thence downward
      toward the knees,
The thin red jellies within you or within me, the bones and the
      marrow in the bones,
The exquisite realization of health;
O I say these are not the parts and poems of the body only, but of the soul,
O I say now these are the soul! 

  Song of the Open World  

7
Here is the efflux of the soul,
The efflux of the soul comes from within through embower'd gates,
      ever provoking questions,
These yearnings why are they? these thoughts in the darkness why are they?
Why are there men and women that while they are nigh me the sunlight
      expands my blood?
Why when they leave me do my pennants of joy sink flat and lank?
Why are there trees I never walk under but large and melodious
      thoughts descend upon me?
(I think they hang there winter and summer on those trees and always
      drop fruit as I pass;)
What is it I interchange so suddenly with strangers?
What with some driver as I ride on the seat by his side?
What with some fisherman drawing his seine by the shore as I walk by
      and pause?
What gives me to be free to a woman's and man's good-will? what
      gives them to be free to mine?

 

  Song of the Answer 2
The indications and tally of time,
Perfect sanity shows the master among philosophs,
Time, always without break, indicates itself in parts,
What always indicates the poet is the crowd of the pleasant company
      of singers, and their words,
The words of the singers are the hours or minutes of the light or dark,
      but the words of the maker of poems are the general light and dark,
The maker of poems settles justice, reality, immortality,
His insight and power encircle things and the human race,
He is the glory and extract thus far of things and of the human race.
The singers do not beget, only the Poet begets,
The singers are welcom'd, understood, appear often enough, but rare
      has the day been, likewise the spot, of the birth of the maker
      of poems, the Answerer,
(Not every century nor every five centuries has contain'd such a
      day, for all its names.)
The singers of successive hours of centuries may have ostensible
      names, but the name of each of them is one of the singers,
The name of each is, eye-singer, ear-singer, head-singer,
      sweet-singer, night-singer, parlor-singer, love-singer,
      weird-singer, or something else.
All this time and at all times wait the words of true poems,
The words of true poems do not merely please,
The true poets are not followers of beauty but the august masters of beauty;
The greatness of sons is the exuding of the greatness of mothers
      and fathers,
The words of true poems are the tuft and final applause of science.
Divine instinct, breadth of vision, the law of reason, health,
      rudeness of body, withdrawnness,
Gayety, sun-tan, air-sweetness, such are some of the words of poems.
The sailor and traveler underlie the maker of poems, the Answerer,
The builder, geometer, chemist, anatomist, phrenologist, artist, all
      these underlie the maker of poems, the Answerer.
The words of the true poems give you more than poems,
They give you to form for yourself poems, religions, politics, war,
      peace, behavior, histories, essays, daily life, and every thing else,
They balance ranks, colors, races, creeds, and the sexes,
They do not seek beauty, they are sought,
Forever touching them or close upon them follows beauty, longing,
      fain, love-sick.
They prepare for death, yet are they not the finish, but rather the outset,
They bring none to his or her terminus or to be content and full,
Whom they take they take into space to behold the birth of stars, to
      learn one of the meanings,
To launch off with absolute faith, to sweep through the ceaseless
      rings and never be quiet again.

 

A song of Joys

 

Yet O my soul supreme!
Knowist thou the joys of pensive thought?
Joys of the free and lonesome heart, the tender, gloomy heart?
Joys of the solitary walk, the spirit bow'd yet proud, the suffering
      and the struggle?
The agonistic throes, the ecstasies, joys of the solemn musings day
      or night?
Joys of the thought of Death, the great spheres Time and Space?
Prophetic joys of better, loftier love's ideals, the divine wife,
      the sweet, eternal, perfect comrade?
Joys all thine own undying one, joys worthy thee O soul.
O while I live to be the ruler of life, not a slave,
To meet life as a powerful conqueror,
No fumes, no ennui, no more complaints or scornful criticisms,
To these proud laws of the air, the water and the ground, proving
      my interior soul impregnable,
And nothing exterior shall ever take command of me.
For not life's joys alone I sing, repeating—the joy of death!
The beautiful touch of Death, soothing and benumbing a few moments,
      for reasons,
Myself discharging my excrementitious body to be burn'd, or render'd
      to powder, or buried,
My real body doubtless left to me for other spheres,
My voided body nothing more to me, returning to the purifications,
      further offices, eternal uses of the earth.
O to attract by more than attraction!
How it is I know not—yet behold! the something which obeys none
      of the rest,
It is offensive, never defensive—yet how magnetic it draws.

 

  A song of the Broad-Axe

5
The place where a great city stands is not the place of stretch'd
      wharves, docks, manufactures, deposits of produce merely,
Nor the place of ceaseless salutes of new-comers or the
      anchor-lifters of the departing,
Nor the place of the tallest and costliest buildings or shops
      selling goods from the rest of the earth,
Nor the place of the best libraries and schools, nor the place where
      money is plentiest,
Nor the place of the most numerous population.
Where the city stands with the brawniest breed of orators and bards,
Where the city stands that is belov'd by these, and loves them in
      return and understands them,
Where no monuments exist to heroes but in the common words and deeds,
Where thrift is in its place, and prudence is in its place,
Where the men and women think lightly of the laws,
Where the slave ceases, and the master of slaves ceases,
Where the populace rise at once against the never-ending audacity of
      elected persons,
Where fierce men and women pour forth as the sea to the whistle of
      death pours its sweeping and unript waves,
Where outside authority enters always after the precedence of inside
      authority,
Where the citizen is always the head and ideal, and President,
      Mayor, Governor and what not, are agents for pay,
Where children are taught to be laws to themselves, and to depend on
      themselves,
Where equanimity is illustrated in affairs,
Where speculations on the soul are encouraged,
Where women walk in public processions in the streets the same as the men,
Where they enter the public assembly and take places the same as the men;
Where the city of the faithfulest friends stands,
Where the city of the cleanliness of the sexes stands,
Where the city of the healthiest fathers stands,
Where the city of the best-bodied mothers stands,
There the great city stands.

 

 

A song for occupations 6

      Will you seek afar off? you surely come back at last,
In things best known to you finding the best, or as good as the best,
In folks nearest to you finding the sweetest, strongest, lovingest,
Happiness, knowledge, not in another place but this place, not for
      another hour but this hour,
Man in the first you see or touch, always in friend, brother,
      nighest neighbor—woman in mother, sister, wife,
The popular tastes and employments taking precedence in poems or anywhere,
You workwomen and workmen of these States having your own divine
      and strong life,
And all else giving place to men and women like you.
When the psalm sings instead of the singer,
When the script preaches instead of the preacher,
When the pulpit descends and goes instead of the carver that carved
      the supporting desk,
When I can touch the body of books by night or by day, and when they
      touch my body back again,
When a university course convinces like a slumbering woman and child
      convince,
When the minted gold in the vault smiles like the night-watchman's daughter,
When warrantee deeds loafe in chairs opposite and are my friendly
      companions,
I intend to reach them my hand, and make as much of them as I do
      of men and women like you.

 

 A song of the Rolling Earth  1
A song of the rolling earth, and of words according,
Were you thinking that those were the words, those upright lines?
      those curves, angles, dots?
No, those are not the words, the substantial words are in the ground
      and sea,
They are in the air, they are in you.
Were you thinking that those were the words, those delicious sounds
      out of your friends' mouths?
No, the real words are more delicious than they.
Human bodies are words, myriads of words,
(In the best poems re-appears the body, man's or woman's,
      well-shaped, natural, gay,
Every part able, active, receptive, without shame or the need of shame.)
Air, soil, water, fire—those are words,
I myself am a word with them—my qualities interpenetrate with
      theirs—my name is nothing to them,
Though it were told in the three thousand languages, what would
      air, soil, water, fire, know of my name?
A healthy presence, a friendly or commanding gesture, are words,
      sayings, meanings,
The charms that go with the mere looks of some men and women,
      are sayings and meanings also.
The workmanship of souls is by those inaudible words of the earth,
The masters know the earth's words and use them more than audible words.
Amelioration is one of the earth's words,
The earth neither lags nor hastens,
It has all attributes, growths, effects, latent in itself from the jump,
It is not half beautiful only, defects and excrescences show just as
      much as perfections show.
The earth does not withhold, it is generous enough,
The truths of the earth continually wait, they are not so conceal'd either,
They are calm, subtle, untransmissible by print,
They are imbued through all things conveying themselves willingly,
Conveying a sentiment and invitation, I utter and utter,
I speak not, yet if you hear me not of what avail am I to you?
To bear, to better, lacking these of what avail am I?
(Accouche! accouchez!
Will you rot your own fruit in yourself there?
Will you squat and stifle there?)
The earth does not argue,
Is not pathetic, has no arrangements,
Does not scream, haste, persuade, threaten, promise,
Makes no discriminations, has no conceivable failures,
Closes nothing, refuses nothing, shuts none out,
Of all the powers, objects, states, it notifies, shuts none out.
The earth does not exhibit itself nor refuse to exhibit itself,
      possesses still underneath,
Underneath the ostensible sounds, the august chorus of heroes, the
      wail of slaves,
Persuasions of lovers, curses, gasps of the dying, laughter of young
      people, accents of bargainers,
Underneath these possessing words that never fall.
To her children the words of the eloquent dumb great mother never fail,
The true words do not fail, for motion does not fail and reflection
      does not fall,
Also the day and night do not fall, and the voyage we pursue does not fall.
Of the interminable sisters,
Of the ceaseless cotillons of sisters,
Of the centripetal and centrifugal sisters, the elder and younger sisters,
The beautiful sister we know dances on with the rest.
With her ample back towards every beholder,
With the fascinations of youth and the equal fascinations of age,
Sits she whom I too love like the rest, sits undisturb'd,
Holding up in her hand what has the character of a mirror, while her
      eyes glance back from it,
Glance as she sits, inviting none, denying none,
Holding a mirror day and night tirelessly before her own face.
Seen at hand or seen at a distance,
Duly the twenty-four appear in public every day,
Duly approach and pass with their companions or a companion,
Looking from no countenances of their own, but from the countenances
      of those who are with them,
From the countenances of children or women or the manly countenance,
From the open countenances of animals or from inanimate things,
From the landscape or waters or from the exquisite apparition of the sky,
From our countenances, mine and yours, faithfully returning them,
Every day in public appearing without fall, but never twice with the
      same companions.
Embracing man, embracing all, proceed the three hundred and
      sixty-five resistlessly round the sun;
Embracing all, soothing, supporting, follow close three hundred and
      sixty-five offsets of the first, sure and necessary as they.
Tumbling on steadily, nothing dreading,
Sunshine, storm, cold, heat, forever withstanding, passing, carrying,
The soul's realization and determination still inheriting,
The fluid vacuum around and ahead still entering and dividing,
No balk retarding, no anchor anchoring, on no rock striking,
Swift, glad, content, unbereav'd, nothing losing,
Of all able and ready at any time to give strict account,
The divine ship sails the divine sea.

 

 By the roadside

 

To a President

All you are doing and saying is to America dangled mirages,
You have not learn'd of Nature—of the politics of Nature you have
      not learn'd the great amplitude, rectitude, impartiality,
You have not seen that only such as they are for these States,
And that what is less than they must sooner or later lift off from
      these States.

I Sit and Look Out

I sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all
      oppression and shame,
I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men at anguish with
      themselves, remorseful after deeds done,
I see in low life the mother misused by her children, dying,
      neglected, gaunt, desperate,
I see the wife misused by her husband, I see the treacherous seducer
      of young women,
I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love attempted to be
      hid, I see these sights on the earth,
I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny, I see martyrs and
      prisoners,
I observe a famine at sea, I observe the sailors casting lots who
      shall be kill'd to preserve the lives of the rest,
I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon
      laborers, the poor, and upon negroes, and the like;
All these—all the meanness and agony without end I sitting look out upon,
See, hear, and am silent.

Memories of President Lincoln

O Captain! My Captain!

O Captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
      But O heart! heart! heart!
      O the bleeding drops of red,
      Where on the deck my Captain lies,
            Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
      Here Captain! dear father!
      This arm beneath your head!
      It is some dream that on the deck,
            You've fallen cold and dead.
My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
      Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
      But I with mournful tread,
            Walk the deck my Captain lies,
            Fallen cold and dead.

 

Autumn Rivulets

 

Song of Prudence

Whatever satisfies souls is true;
Prudence entirely satisfies the craving and glut of souls,
Itself only finally satisfies the soul,
The soul has that measureless pride which revolts from every lesson
      but its own.
Now I breathe the word of the prudence that walks abreast with time,
      space, reality,
That answers the pride which refuses every lesson but its own.
What is prudence is indivisible,
Declines to separate one part of life from every part,
Divides not the righteous from the unrighteous or the living from the dead,
Matches every thought or act by its correlative,
Knows no possible forgiveness or deputed atonement,
Knows that the young man who composedly peril'd his life and lost it
      has done exceedingly well for himself without doubt,
That he who never peril'd his life, but retains it to old age in
      riches and ease, has probably achiev'd nothing for himself worth
      mentioning,
Knows that only that person has really learn'd who has learn'd to
      prefer results,
Who favors body and soul the same,
Who perceives the indirect assuredly following the direct,
Who in his spirit in any emergency whatever neither hurries nor
      avoids death.

 

Wandering at Morn

Wandering at morn,
Emerging from the night from gloomy thoughts, thee in my thoughts,
Yearning for thee harmonious Union! thee, singing bird divine!
Thee coil'd in evil times my country, with craft and black dismay,
      with every meanness, treason thrust upon thee,
This common marvel I beheld—the parent thrush I watch'd feeding its young,
The singing thrush whose tones of joy and faith ecstatic,
Fail not to certify and cheer my soul.
There ponder'd, felt I,
If worms, snakes, loathsome grubs, may to sweet spiritual songs be turn'd,
If vermin so transposed, so used and bless'd may be,
Then may I trust in you, your fortunes, days, my country;
Who knows but these may be the lessons fit for you?
From these your future song may rise with joyous trills,
Destin'd to fill the world.

 

The sleepers

7
A show of the summer softness—a contact of something unseen—an
      amour of the light and air,
I am jealous and overwhelm'd with friendliness,
And will go gallivant with the light and air myself.

O love and summer, you are in the dreams and in me,
Autumn and winter are in the dreams, the farmer goes with his thrift,
The droves and crops increase, the barns are well-fill'd.
Elements merge in the night, ships make tacks in the dreams,
The sailor sails, the exile returns home,
The fugitive returns unharm'd, 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-fill'd 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 fail'd,
The great already known and the great any time after to-day,
The stammerer, the sick, the perfect-form'd, 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 wrong'd,
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 liken'd them and restored them.
I swear they are all beautiful,
Every one that sleeps is beautiful, every thing in the dim light is
      beautiful,
The wildest and bloodiest is over, and all is peace.
Peace is always beautiful,
The myth of heaven indicates peace and night.
The myth of heaven indicates the soul,
The soul is always beautiful, it appears more or it appears less, it
      comes or it lags behind,
It comes from its embower'd garden and looks pleasantly on itself
      and encloses the world,
Perfect and clean the genitals previously jetting,and perfect and
      clean the womb cohering,
The head well-grown proportion'd and plumb, and the bowels and
      joints proportion'd and plumb.
The soul is always beautiful,
The universe is duly in order, every thing is in its place,
What has arrived is in its place and what waits shall be in its place,
The twisted skull waits, the watery or rotten blood waits,
The child of the glutton or venerealee waits long, and the child of
      the drunkard waits long, and the drunkard himself waits long,
The sleepers that lived and died wait, the far advanced are to go on
      in their turns, and the far behind are to come on in their turns,
The diverse shall be no less diverse, but they shall flow and unite—
      they unite now.

      8
The sleepers are very beautiful as they lie unclothed,
They flow hand in hand over the whole earth from east to west as
      they lie unclothed,
The Asiatic and African are hand in hand, the European and American
      are hand in hand,
Learn'd and unlearn'd are hand in hand, and male and female are hand
      in hand,
The bare arm of the girl crosses the bare breast of her lover, they
      press close without lust, his lips press her neck,
The father holds his grown or ungrown son in his arms with
      measureless love, and the son holds the father in his arms with
      measureless love,
The white hair of the mother shines on the white wrist of the daughter,
The breath of the boy goes with the breath of the man, friend is
      inarm'd by friend,
The scholar kisses the teacher and the teacher kisses the scholar,
      the wrong 'd made right,
The call of the slave is one with the master's call, and the master
      salutes the slave,
The felon steps forth from the prison, the insane becomes sane, the
      suffering of sick persons is reliev'd,
The sweatings and fevers stop, the throat that was unsound is sound,
      the lungs of the consumptive are resumed, the poor distress'd
      head is free,
The joints of the rheumatic move as smoothly as ever, and smoother
      than ever,
Stiflings and passages open, the paralyzed become supple,
The swell'd and convuls'd and congested awake to themselves in condition,
They pass the invigoration of the night and the chemistry of the
      night, and awake.
I too pass from the night,
I stay a while away O night, but I return to you again and love you.
Why should I be afraid to trust myself to you?
I am not afraid, I have been well brought forward by you,
I love the rich running day, but I do not desert her in whom I lay so long,
I know not how I came of you and I know not where I go with you, but
      I know I came well and shall go well.
I will stop only a time with the night, and rise betimes,
I will duly pass the day O my mother, and duly return to you.

      Transpositions
Let the reformers descend from the stands where they are forever
      bawling—let an idiot or insane person appear on each of the stands;
Let judges and criminals be transposed—let the prison-keepers be
      put in prison—let those that were prisoners take the keys;
Let them that distrust birth and death lead the rest.

 

 Whispers of the heavenly death

 

Assurances

I need no assurances, I am a man who is preoccupied of his own soul;
I do not doubt that from under the feet and beside the hands and
      face I am cognizant of, are now looking faces I am not cognizant
      of, calm and actual faces,
I do not doubt but the majesty and beauty of the world are latent in
      any iota of the world,
I do not doubt I am limitless, and that the universes are limitless,
      in vain I try to think how limitless,
I do not doubt that the orbs and the systems of orbs play their
      swift sports through the air on purpose, and that I shall one day
      be eligible to do as much as they, and more than they,
I do not doubt that temporary affairs keep on and on millions of years,
I do not doubt interiors have their interiors, and exteriors have
      their exteriors, and that the eyesight has another eyesight, and
      the hearing another hearing, and the voice another voice,
I do not doubt that the passionately-wept deaths of young men are
      provided for, and that the deaths of young women and the
      deaths of little children are provided for,
(Did you think Life was so well provided for, and Death, the purport
      of all Life, is not well provided for?)
I do not doubt that wrecks at sea, no matter what the horrors of
      them, no matter whose wife, child, husband, father, lover, has
      gone down, are provided for, to the minutest points,
I do not doubt that whatever can possibly happen anywhere at any
      time, is provided for in the inherences of things,
I do not think Life provides for all and for Time and Space, but I
      believe Heavenly Death provides for all. 

 

Sand at seventy (first annex)

  

 

Out of May's Shows Selected

Apple orchards, the trees all cover'd with blossoms;
Wheat fields carpeted far and near in vital emerald green;
The eternal, exhaustless freshness of each early morning;
The yellow, golden, transparent haze of the warm afternoon sun;
The aspiring lilac bushes with profuse purple or white flowers.

 

"Going Somewhere"

My science-friend, my noblest woman-friend,
(Now buried in an English grave—and this a memory-leaf for her dear sake,)
Ended our talk—"The sum, concluding all we know of old or modern
      learning, intuitions deep,
"Of all Geologies—Histories—of all Astronomy—of Evolution,
      Metaphysics all,
"Is, that we all are onward, onward, speeding slowly, surely bettering,
"Life, life an endless march, an endless army, (no halt, but it is
      duly over,)
"The world, the race, the soul—in space and time the universes,
"All bound as is befitting each—all surely going somewhere."

 

 

The Voice of the Rain

And who art thou? said I to the soft-falling shower,
Which, strange to tell, gave me an answer, as here translated:
I am the Poem of Earth, said the voice of the rain,
Eternal I rise impalpable out of the land and the bottomless sea,
Upward to heaven, whence, vaguely form'd, altogether changed, and
      yet the same,
I descend to lave the drouths, atomies, dust-layers of the globe,
And all that in them without me were seeds only, latent, unborn;
And forever, by day and night, I give back life to my own origin,
      and make pure and beautify it;
(For song, issuing from its birth-place, after fulfilment, wandering,
Reck'd or unreck'd, duly with love returns.)

 

 Good-bye My fancy (second annex)

Old Chants

An ancient song, reciting, ending,
Once gazing toward thee, Mother of All,
Musing, seeking themes fitted for thee,
Accept me, thou saidst, the elder ballads,
And name for me before thou goest each ancient poet.
(Of many debts incalculable,
Haply our New World's chieftest debt is to old poems.)
Ever so far back, preluding thee, America,
Old chants, Egyptian priests, and those of Ethiopia,
The Hindu epics, the Grecian, Chinese, Persian,
The Biblic books and prophets, and deep idyls of the Nazarene,
The Iliad, Odyssey, plots, doings, wanderings of Eneas,
Hesiod, Eschylus, Sophocles, Merlin, Arthur,
The Cid, Roland at Roncesvalles, the Nibelungen,
The troubadours, minstrels, minnesingers, skalds,
Chaucer, Dante, flocks of singing birds,
The Border Minstrelsy, the bye-gone ballads, feudal tales, essays, plays,
Shakespere, Schiller, Walter Scott, Tennyson,
As some vast wondrous weird dream-presences,
The great shadowy groups gathering around,
Darting their mighty masterful eyes forward at thee,
Thou! with as now thy bending neck and head, with courteous hand
      and word, ascending,
Thou! pausing a moment, drooping thine eyes upon them, blent
      with their music,
Well pleased, accepting all, curiously prepared for by them,
Thou enterest at thy entrance porch.