Walt Whitman

"Something startles me where I thought I was safest; I withdraw from the still woods I loved; I will not go now on the pastures to walk; I will not"

"America always! Always our own feuillage! Always Florida's green peninsula! Always the priceless delta of Louisiana! Always the cotton-fields of Ala"

"You felons on trial in courts; You convicts in prison-cells, you sentenced assassins, chaind and hand-cuffd with iron; Who am I, too, that I am"

"One song, America, before I go, I'd sing, o'er all the rest, with trumpet sound, For thee - the Future. I'd sow a seed for thee of endless Nationa"

"Thought of the Infinite - the All! Be thou my God. Lover Divine, and Perfect Comrade! Waiting, content, invisible yet, but certain, Be thou my Go"

"Aroused and angry, I thought to beat the alarum, and urge relentless war; But soon my fingers fail'd me, my face droop'd, and I resign'd myself, To"

"Not youth pertains to me, Nor delicatesse - I cannot beguile the time with talk; Awkward in the parlor, neither a dancer nor elegant; In the learn'"

"As if a phantom caress'd me, I thought I was not alone, walking here by the shore; But the one I thought was with me, as now I walk by the shore--th"

"In former songs Pride have I sung, and Love, and passionate, joyful Life, But here I twine the strands of Patriotism and Death. And now, Life, Prid"

"That shadow, my likeness, that goes to and fro, seeking a livelihood, chattering, chaffering; How often I find myself standing and looking at it wher"

"Through the ample open door of the peaceful country barn, A sun-lit pasture field, with cattle and horses feeding; And haze, and vista, and the far"

"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 singi"

"A mask, a perpetual natural disguiser of herself, Concealing her face, concealing her form, Changes and transformations every hour, every moment, F"

"As I sat alone, by blue Ontario's shore, As I mused of these mighty days, and of peace return'd, and the dead that return no more, A Phantom, gigant"

"These, I, singing in spring, collect for lovers, (For who but I should understand lovers, and all their sorrow and joy? And who but I should be the"

"In a faraway northern county, in the placid, pastoral region, Lives my farmer friend, the theme of my recitative, a famous Tamer of Oxen: There they"

"Passing stranger! you do not know how longingly I look upon you, You must be he I was seeking, or she I was seeking, (it comes to me, as of a dream,)"

"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 cog"

"Unfolded out of the folds of the woman, man comes unfolded, and is always to come unfolded; Unfolded only out of the superbest woman of the earth, is"

"Only themselves understand themselves, and the like of themselves, As Souls only understand Souls."

"Of the terrible doubt of appearances, Of the uncertainty after all - that we may be deluded, That may-be reliance and hope are but speculations afte"

"AS I walk these broad, majestic days of peace, (For the war, the struggle of blood finish'd, wherein, O terrific Ideal! Against vast odds, having gl"

"By broad Potomac's shore--again, old tongue! (Still uttering--still ejaculating--canst never cease this babble?) Again, old heart so gay--again to y"

"As I ponder'd in silence, Returning upon my poems, considering, lingering long, A Phantom arose before me, with distrustful aspect, Terrible in bea"

"On my northwest coast in the midst of the night, a fishermen's group stands watching; Out on the lake, that expands before them, others are spearing"

"AT the last, tenderly, From the walls of the powerful, fortress'd house, From the clasp of the knitted locks from the keep of the well-closed doors,"

"When I peruse the conquer'd fame of heroes, and the victories of mighty generals, I do not envy the generals, Nor the President in his Presidency, no"

"Despairing cries float ceaselessly toward me, day and night, The sad voice of Death--the call of my nearest lover, putting forth, alarmed, uncertain,"

"To the garden, the world, anew ascending, Potent mates, daughters, sons, preluding, The love, the life of their bodies, meaning and being, Curious,"

"Gliding o'er all, through all, Through Nature, Time, and Space, As a ship on the waters advancing, The voyage of the soul - not life alone, Death,"

"O take my hand, Walt Whitman! Such gliding wonders! such sights and sounds! Such join'd unended links, each hook'd to the next! Each answering all"

"In the new garden, in all the parts, In cities now, modern, I wander, Though the second or third result, or still further, primitive yet, Days, pla"

"Who are you, dusky woman, so ancient, hardly human, With your woolly-white and turban'd head, and bare bony feet? Why, rising by the roadside here,"

"Among the men and women, the multitude, I perceive one picking me out by secret and divine signs, Acknowledging none else--not parent, wife, husband"

"Who learns my lesson complete? Boss, journeyman, apprentice, churchman and atheist, The stupid and the wise thinker, parents and offspring, merchant"

"In midnight sleep, of many a face of anguish, Of the look at first of the mortally wounded - of that indescribable look; Of the dead on their backs,"

"What best I see in thee, Is not that where thou mov'st down history's great highways, Ever undimm'd by time shoots warlike victory's dazzle, Or tha"

"To thee, old Cause! Thou peerless, passionate, good cause! Thou stern, remorseless, sweet Idea! Deathless throughout the ages, races, lands! After"

"Years of the modern! years of the unperform'd! Your horizon rises, I see it parting away for more august dramas; I see not America only, I see not o"

"For him I sing, I raise the Present on the Past, (As some perennial tree, out of its roots, the present on the past:) With time and space I him dil"

"Tears! tears! tears! In the night, in solitude, tears; On the white shore dripping, dripping, suck'd in by the sand; Tears not a star shining all d"

"What place is besieged, and vainly tries to raise the siege? Lo! I send to that place a commander, swift, brave, immortal; And with him horse and fo"

"I thought I was not alone, walking here by the shore, But the one I thought was with me, as now I walk by the shore, As I lean and look through the"

"A song of the good green grass! A song no more of the city streets; A song of farms - a song of the soil of fields. A song with the smell of sun-d"

"To Oratists, to male or female, Vocalism, measure, concentration, determination, and the divine power to use words. Are you full-lung'd and limber-l"

"To-day, from each and all, a breath of prayer, a pulse of thought, To memory of Him, to birth of Him."

"Wandering at morn, Emerging from the night, from gloomy thoughts, thee in my thoughts, Yearning for thee, harmonious Union! thee, Singing Bird divin"

"O sight of shame, and pain, and dole! O fearful thought a convict Soul! Rang the refrain along the hall, the prison, Rose to the roof, the vaults"

"Beat! beat! drums!--Blow! bugles! blow! Through the windows--through doors--burst like a ruthless force, Into the solemn church, and scatter the con"

"Out of the cradle endlessly rocking, Out of the mocking-birds throat, the musical shuttle, Out of the Ninth-month midnight, Over the sterile sa"

"Come, said the Muse, Sing me a song no poet yet has chanted, Sing me the Universal. In this broad Earth of ours, Amid the measureless grossness a"

"Others may praise what they like; But I, from the banks of the running Missouri, praise nothing, in art, or aught else, Till it has well inhaled the"

"The business man, the acquirer vast, After assiduous years, surveying results, preparing for departure, Devises houses and lands to his children beq"

"I dream'd in a dream, I saw a city invincible to the attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth; I dream'd that was the new City of Friends; Noth"

"This dust was once the Man, Gentle, plain, just and resolute under whose cautious hand, Against the foulest crime in history known in any land or ag"

"The world below the brine; Forests at the bottom of the sea the branches and leaves, Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seeds the thick"

"I I CELEBRATE myself; And what I assume you shall assume; For every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you.      I loafe and invite my"

"Who includes diversity, and is Nature, Who is the amplitude of the earth, and the coarseness and sexuality of the earth, and the great charity of the"

"Fast-anchor'd, eternal, O love! O woman I love! O bride! O wife! more resistless than I can tell, the thought of you! Then separate, as disembodied,"

"Race of veterans! Race of victors! Race of the soil, ready for conflict! race of the conquering march! (No more credulity's race, abiding-temper'd r"