Walt Whitman Poems

HOLD it up sternly! See this it sends back! (Who is it? Is it you?)
Outside fair costume--within ashes and filth,
No more a flashing eye--no more a sonorous voice or springy step;
...

O ME, man of slack faith so long!
Standing aloof--denying portions so long;
Only aware to-day of compact, all-diffused truth;
...

O ME! O life!... of the questions of these recurring;
Of the endless trains of the faithless--of cities fill'd with the
foolish;
...

I Hear America singing, the varied carols I hear;
Those of mechanics- each one singing his, as it should be, blithe and strong;
...

Women sit, or move to and fro- some old,
some young;
...

THAT which eludes this verse and any verse,
Unheard by sharpest ear, unform'd in clearest eye or cunningest mind,
Nor lore nor fame, nor happiness nor wealth,
And yet the pulse of every heart and life throughout the world
...

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

A march in the ranks hard-prest, and the road unknown;
A route through a heavy wood, with muffled steps in the darkness;
Our army foil'd with loss severe, and the sullen remnant retreating;
...

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.
...

TO get betimes in Boston town, I rose this morning early;
Here's a good place at the corner--I must stand and see the show.

...