Walt Whitman

"Out from behind this bending, rough-cut Mask, (All straighter, liker Masks rejected - this preferr'd,) This common curtain of the face, contain'd in"

"Turn, O Libertad, for the war is over, (From it and all henceforth expanding, doubting no more, resolute, sweeping the world,) Turn from lands retro"

"POET. O A new song, a free song, Flapping, flapping, flapping, flapping, by sounds, by voices clearer, By the wind's voice and that of the drum,"

"A batter'd, wreck'd old man, Thrown on this savage shore, far, far from home, Pent by the sea, and dark rebellious brows, twelve dreary months, Sor"

"O star of France! The brightness of thy hope and strength and fame, Like some proud ship that led the fleet so long, Beseems to-day a wreck, driven"

"What am I, after all, but a child, pleas'd with the sound of my own name? repeating it over and over; I stand apart to hear, it never tires me. To"

"The untold want, by life and land ne'er granted, Now, Voyager, sail thou forth, to seek and find."

"Quicksand years that whirl me I know not whither, Your schemes, politics, fail, lines give way, substances mock and elude me, Only the theme I sing,"

"O mater! O fils! O brood continental! O flowers of the prairies! O space boundless! O hum of mighty products! O you teeming cities! O so invincibl"

"With all thy gifts, America, (Standing secure, rapidly tending, overlooking the world,) Power, wealth, extent, vouchsafed to thee, With these, and l"

"Give me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-dazzling; Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the orchard; Give me a field wher"

"What General has a good army in himself, has a good army; He happy in himself, or she happy in herself, is happy, But I tell you you cannot be happy"

"O you whom I often and silently come where you are, that I may be with you; As I walk by your side, or sit near, or remain in the same room with you,"

"Aboard, at a ship's helm, A young steersman, steering with care. A bell through fog on a sea-coast dolefully ringing, An ocean-bell--O a warning b"

"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 wit"

"And now, gentlemen, A word I give to remain in your memories and minds, As base, and finale too, for all metaphysics. (So, to the students, the ol"

"World, take good notice, silver stars fading, Milky hue ript, weft of white detaching, Coals thirty-eight, baleful and burning, Scarlet, significan"

"Proud music of the storm! Blast that careers so free, whistling across the prairies! Strong hum of forest tree-tops! Wind of the mountains! Personi"

"To think of time, of all that retrospection! To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward! Have you guess'd you yourself would not conti"

"Out of the cradle endlessly rocking, Out of the mocking-bird's throat, the musical shuttle, Out of the Ninth-month midnight, Over the sterile sands"

"Whispers of heavenly death, murmur'd I hear; Labial gossip of night, sibilant chorals; Footsteps gently ascending, mystical breezes, wafted soft and"

"Be composed, be at ease with me, I am Walt Whitman, liberal and lusty as Nature; Not till the sun excludes you, do I exclude you; Not till the water"

"No labor-saving machine, Nor discovery have I made; Nor will I be able to leave behind me any wealthy bequest to found a hospital or library, Nor r"

"O Hymen! O hymenee! Why do you tantalize me thus? O why sting me for a swift moment only? Why can you not continue? O why do you now cease? Is it"

"Hours continuing long, sore and heavy-hearted, Hours of the dusk, when I withdraw to a lonesome and unfrequented spot, seating myself, leaning my fac"

"Come closer to me; Push close, my lovers, and take the best I possess; Yield closer and closer, and give me the best you possess. This is unfinish"

"AS at thy portals also death, Entering thy sovereign, dim, illimitable grounds, To memories of my mother, to the divine blending, maternity, To her"

"I met a seer, Passing the hues and objects of the world, The fields of art and learning, pleasure, sense, To glean eidolons. Put in thy chants sa"

"Joy! shipmate - joy! (Pleas'd to my Soul at death I cry;) Our life is closed - our life begins; The long, long anchorage we leave, The ship is cle"

"Word over all, beautiful as the sky! Beautiful that war, and all its deeds of carnage, must in time be utterly lost; That the hands of the sisters D"

"Small is the theme of the following Chant, yet the greatest - namely, One's-Self - that wondrous thing a simple, separate person. That, for the use"

"On the beach, at night, Stands a child, with her father, Watching the east, the autumn sky. Up through the darkness, While ravening clouds, the b"

"Far hence, amid an isle of wondrous beauty, Crouching over a grave, an ancient, sorrowful mother, Once a queen - now lean and tatter'd, seated on th"

"Come, I will make the continent indissoluble; I will make the most splendid race the sun ever yet shone upon; I will make divine magnetic lands, Wi"

"When I heard at the close of the day how my name had been receiv'd with plaudits in the capitol, still it was not a happy night for me that follow'd;"

"They shall arise in the States, They shall report Nature, laws, physiology, and happiness; They shall illustrate Democracy and the kosmos; They sha"

"Delicate cluster! flag of teeming life! Covering all my lands! all my sea-shores lining! Flag of death! (how I watch'd you through the smoke of batt"

"Shut not your doors to me, proud libraries, For that which was lacking on all your well-fill'd shelves, yet needed most, I bring; Forth from the arm"

"Lo! Victress on the peaks! Where thou, with mighty brow, regarding the world, (The world, O Libertad, that vainly conspired against thee;) Out of i"

"The noble Sire, fallen on evil days, I saw, with hand uplifted, menacing, brandishing, (Memories of old in abeyance, love and faith in abeyance,) T"

"A leaf for hand in hand! You natural persons old and young! You on the Mississippi, and on all the branches and bayous of the Mississippi! You fri"

"Forms, qualities, lives, humanity, language, thoughts, The ones known, and the ones unknown - the ones on the stars, The stars themselves, some shap"

"Not the pilot has charged himself to bring his ship into port, though beaten back, and many times baffled; Not the path-finder, penetrating inland, w"

"Let us twain walk aside from the rest; Now we are together privately, do you discard ceremony, Come! vouchsafe to me what has yet been vouchsafed to"

"Earth! my likeness! Though you look so impassive, ample and spheric there, I now suspect that is not all; I now suspect there is something fierce i"

"From all the rest I single out you, having a message for you: You are to die Let others tell you what they please, I cannot prevaricate, I am exact"

"I was looking a long while for a clue to the history of the past for myself, and for these chants - and now I have found it; It is not in those paged"

"From far Dakota's caons, Lands of the wild ravine, the dusky Sioux, the lonesome stretch, the silence, Haply to-day a mournful wail, haply a trumpe"

"Singing my days, Singing the great achievements of the present, Singing the strong, light works of engineers, Our modern wonders, (the antique pond"

"Respondez! Respondez! (The war is completed the price is paid the title is settled beyond recall;) Let every one answer! let those who sleep be wake"

"Great are the myths - I too delight in them; Great are Adam and Eve - I too look back and accept them; Great the risen and fallen nations, and their"

"O living always - always dying! O the burials of me, past and present! O me, while I stride ahead, material, visible, imperious as ever! O me, what"

"Manhattan's streets I saunter'd, pondering, On time, space, reality - on such as these, and abreast with them, prudence. After all, the last explan"

"Is reform needed? Is it through you? The greater the reform needed, the greater the personality you need to accomplish it. You! do you not see how"

"To the leaven'd soil they trod, calling, I sing, for the last; (Not cities, nor man alone, nor war, nor the dead, But forth from my tent emerging fo"

"A newer garden of creation, no primal solitude, Dense, joyous, modern, populous millions, cities and farms, With iron interlaced, composite, tied, m"

"City of orgies, walks and joys! City whom that I have lived and sung in your midst will one day make you illustrious, Not the pageants of you--not y"

"Now I make a leaf of Voices, for I have found nothing mightier than they are, And I have found that no word spoken, but is beautiful, in its place."

"I saw old General at bay; (Old as he was, his grey eyes yet shone out in battle like stars;) His small force was now completely hemm'd in, in his wo"

"O magnet-south! O glistening, perfumed South! My South! O quick mettle, rich blood, impulse, and love! Good and evil! O all dear to me! O dear to"