Leaves Of Grass: The First Edition of 1855 + The Death Bed Edition of 1892

by Walt Whitman

I perceive I have not really understood any thing, not a single object, and that no man ever can, Nature here in sight of the sea taking advantage of me to dart upon me and sting me, Because I have dared to open my mouth to sing at all.

The World below the Brine

Reminds me of the kelp beds.

Forests at the bottom of the sea, the branches and leaves,

To a President

Which one? Could be any one of them, right up to today!

I Sit and Look Out

All these — all the meanness and agony without end I sitting look out upon, See, hear, and am silent.

To Rich Givers

What you give me I cheerfully accept, A little sustenance, a hut and garden, a little money, as I rendezvous with my poems, A traveler’s lodging and breakfast as journey through the States, — why should I be ashamed to own such gifts? why to advertise for them? For I myself am not one who bestows nothing upon man and woman, For I bestow upon any man or woman the entrance to all the gifts of the universe.

My poetry? Priceless!! This guy DEFINITELY doesn't have ANY self-esteem issues!

The Dalliance of the Eagles

Nice visual image.

Beautiful Women

Women sit or move to and fro, some old, some young, The young are beautiful — but the old are more beautiful than the young.

I suppose.

Thought

Of obedience, faith, adhesiveness; As I stand aloof and look there is to me something profoundly affecting in large masses of men following the lead of those who do not believe in men.

True to this very day.

Thought

Of justice — as If could be any thing but the same ample law, expounded by natural judges and saviors, As if it might be this thing or that thing, according to decisions.

But it sure is now! Nice to know nothing's changed.

Hast Never Come to Thee an Hour

Hast never come to thee an hour, A sudden gleam divine, precipitating, bursting all these bubbles, fashions, wealth? These eager business aims — books, politics, art, amours, To utter nothingness?

"Hear O voices of my souls, this is the world of illusion."

Thought

Of Equality — as if it harm’d me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself — as if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.

Oh, to imagine everyone believing this!

To Old Age

I see in you the estuary that enlarges and spreads itself grandly as it pours in the great sea.

To The States [To Identify the 16th, 17th, or 18th Presidentiad]

Why reclining, interrogating? why myself and all drowsing? What deepening twilight-scum floating atop of the waters, Who are they as bats and night-dogs askant in the capitol?

What a filthy Presidentiad! (O South, your torrid suns! O North, your arctic freezings!) Are those really Congressmen? are those the great Judges? is that the President?

Then I will sleep awhile yet, for I see that these States sleep, for reasons; (With gathering murk, with muttering thunder and lambent shoots we all duly awake, South, North, East, West, inland and seaboard, we will surely awake.)

We haven't woken up yet!

First O Songs for a Prelude

First O songs for a prelude, Lightly strike on the stretch’d tympanum pride and joy in my city, How she led the rest to arms, how she gave the cue, How at once with lithe limbs unwaiting a moment she sprang, (O superb! O Manhattan, my own, my peerless! O strongest you in the hour of danger, in crisis! O truer than steel!) How you sprang — how you threw off the costumes of peace with indifferent hand,

I guess we won't mention the Draft Riots.

Eighteen Sixty-One

Just love those guys in their uniforms.

Beat! Beat! Drums!

Famous poem.

The Wound-Dresser

Very moving.

Ethiopia Saluting the Colors

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, do you the colors greet?

Me master years a hundred since from my parents sunder’d, A little child, they caught me as the savage beast is caught, Then hither me across the sea the cruel slaver brought.

Look Down Fair Moon

Look down fair moon and bathe this scene, Pour softly down night’s nimbus floods on faces ghastly, swollen, purple, On the dead on their backs with arms toss’d wide, Pour down your unstinted nimbus sacred moon.

Reconciliation

For my enemy is dead, a man divine as myself is dead, I look where he lies white-faced and still in the coffin — I draw near, Bend down and touch lightly with my lips the white face in the coffin.

How Solemn As One by One [Washington City, 1865]

How solemn as one by one, As the ranks returning worn and sweaty, as the men file by where stand, As the faces the masks appear, as I glance at the faces studying the masks,

I see behind each mask that wonder a kindred soul,

The soul! yourself I see, great as any, good as the best, Waiting secure and content, which the bullet could never kill, Nor the bayonet stab O friend.

As I Lay with My Head in Your Lap Camerado

I know I am restless and make others so,

heed not and have never heeded either experience, cautions, majorities, nor ridicule, And the threat of what is call’d hell is little or nothing to me, And the lure of what is call’d heaven is little or nothing to me;

Dear camerado! I confess I have urged you onward with me, and still urge you, without the least idea what is our destination, Or whether we shall be victorious, or utterly quell’d and defeated.

To a Certain Civilian

Did you ask dulcet rhymes from me? Did you seek the civilian’s peaceful and languishing rhymes? Did you find what I sang erewhile so hard to follow?

Why I was not singing erewhile for you to follow, to understand — nor am I now;

What to such as you anyhow such a poet as I? therefore leave my works, And go lull yourself with what you can understand, and with piano-tunes, For I lull nobody, and you will never understand me.

When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d