Walt Whitman > Quotes

“Resist much. Obey little.”
― Walt Whitman

“What is that you express in your eyes? It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.”
― Walt Whitman

“This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.”
― Walt Whitman

“Do I contradict myself? Very well, then, I contradict myself; I am large -- I contain multitudes.”
― Walt Whitman

“We were together. I forget the rest.”
― Walt Whitman

“Be curious, not judgmental.”
― Walt Whitman

“I am as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best. ”
― Walt Whitman

“Failing to fetch me at first, keep encouraged. Missing me one place, search another. I stop somewhere waiting for you.”
― Walt Whitman

“Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.”
― Walt Whitman

“Happiness, not in another place but this place...not for another hour, but this hour.”
― Walt Whitman

“Keep your face always toward the sunshine - and shadows will fall behind you. ”
― Walt Whitman

“I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don't believe I deserved my friends.”
― Walt Whitman

“And your very flesh shall be a great poem.”
― Walt Whitman

“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 the far the largest to me, and that is myself,
And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years,
I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness, I can wait.”
― Walt Whitman

“I have learned that to be with those I like is enough”
― Walt Whitman

“Not I, nor anyone else can travel that road for you.
You must travel it by yourself.
It is not far. It is within reach.
Perhaps you have been on it since you were born, and did not know.
Perhaps it is everywhere - on water and land.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.”
― Walt Whitman

“Do anything, but let it produce joy.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“I discover myself on the verge of a usual mistake.”
― Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

“If you done it, it ain't bragging.”
― Walt Whitman

“I sound my barbaric yawp over the rooftops of the world.”
― Walt Whitman

“When I give, I give myself.”
― Walt Whitman

“In the faces of men and women, I see God.”
― Walt Whitman

“I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

32. I think I could turn and live with animals, they're so placid and self-contained,
I stand and look at them and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition.
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins.
They do not make me sick discussiong their duty to God,
Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owning things,
Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago,
Not one is respectable or unhappy over the earth.

52. The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains of my gab and loitering.

I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound my barbaric YAWP over the roofs of the world.”
― Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

“Re-examine all you have been told...
Dismiss what insults your Soul.”
― Walt Whitman

“Peace is always beautiful.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“Battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“Argue not concerning God,…re-examine all that you have been told at church or school or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your soul…”
― Walt Whitman

“Afoot and lighthearted I take to the open road, healthy, free, the world before me.”
― Walt Whitman

“And as to me, I know nothing else but miracles”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you/ That you may be my poem/ I whisper with my lips close to your ear/ I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you.”
― Walt Whitman

“I think I could turn and live with the animals, they are so placid and self contained;
I stand and look at them long and long.
They do not sweat and whine about their condition;
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins;
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God;
Not one is dissatisfied-not one is demented with the mania of owning things;
Not one kneels to another, nor his kind that lived thousands of years ago;
Not one is responsible or industrious over the whole earth.”
― Walt Whitman

“The real war will never get in the books.”
― Walt Whitman

“I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars.”
― Walt Whitman

“Be not ashamed women, ... You are the gates of the body, and you are the gates of the soul.”
― Walt Whitman

“O captain! My Captain!
Our fearful trip is done.
The ship has weather'd every wrack
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 Heart! Heart! Heart!
O the bleeding drops of red
Where on the deck my captain lies
Fallen cold and dead.”
― Walt Whitman

“O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring;
Of the endless trains of the faithless—of cities fill’d with the foolish;
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light—of the objects mean—of the struggle ever renew’d;
Of the poor results of all—of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me;
Of the empty and useless years of the rest—with the rest me intertwined;
The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.

That you are here—that life exists, and identity;
That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“I am satisfied ... I see, dance, laugh, sing.
”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“WE two boys together clinging,
One the other never leaving,
Up and down the roads going, North and South excursions making,
Power enjoying, elbows stretching, fingers clutching,
Arm'd and fearless, eating, drinking, sleeping, loving.
No law less than ourselves owning, sailing, soldiering, thieving,
threatening,
Misers, menials, priests alarming, air breathing, water drinking, on
the turf or the sea-beach dancing,
Cities wrenching, ease scorning, statutes mocking, feebleness
chasing,
Fulfilling our foray.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“Long enough have you dream'd contemptible dreams,
Now I wash the gum from your eyes,
You must habit yourself to the dazzle of the light
and of every moment of your life”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“Now I see the secret of making the best person: it is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.”
― Walt Whitman

“I act as the tongue of you,
... tied in your mouth . . . . in mine it begins to be loosened.”
― Walt Whitman

“From this hour I ordain myself loos'd of limits and imaginary lines.”
― Walt Whitman

“I cannot be awake, for nothing looks to me as it did before, or else I am awake for the first time, and all before has been a mean sleep.”
― Walt Whitman

“If you want me again look for me under your boot soles.”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“There is no God any more divine than Yourself.”
― Walt Whitman

“I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least.”
― Walt Whitman

“Are you the new person drawn toward me?
To begin with, take warning - I am surely far different from what you suppose;
Do you suppose you will find in me your ideal?
Do you think it so easy to have me become your lover?
Do you think the friendship of me would be unalloy'd satisfaction?
Do you think I am trusty and faithful?
Do you see no further than this façade—this smooth and tolerant manner of me?
Do you suppose yourself advancing on real ground toward a real heroic man?
Have you no thought, O dreamer, that it may be all maya, illusion?”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

“this is thy hour o soul, thy free flight into the wordless,
away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson
done,
thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the
themes thou lovest best,
night, sleep, death and the stars.”
― Walt Whitman

“To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a little better place than we found it, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life breathed easier because you lived. This is to have succeeded.”
― Walt Whitman