“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
“I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars.”
― Walt Whitman
“A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more
than he. I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green
stuff woven.
Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see
and remark, and say Whose?
-- Walt Whitman
“After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, conviviality, and so on - have found that none of these finally satisfy, or permanently wear - what remains? Nature remains.”
― Walt Whitman
“Now, Voyager, sail thou forth, to seek and find."
― Walt Whitman
“I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love.
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good help to you nevertheless
And filter and fiber your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop some where waiting for you”
― Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“This is what you shall do: Love the earth and the 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, reexamine 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, Leaves of Grass
“To me, every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.”
― Walt Whitman
“The smallest sprout shows there is really no death;
And if ever there was, it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it,
And ceas’d the moment life appear’d.
All goes onward and outward—nothing collapses;
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.”
― Walt Whitman
“We were
together. I forget the rest.”
― Walt
Whitman
“Keep
your face always toward the sunshine - and shadows will fall behind you.”
― Walt
Whitman
“Happiness,
not in another place but this place...not for another hour, but this hour.”
― 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
“Peace is
always beautiful.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“Re-examine
all you have been told...
Dismiss
what insults your Soul.”
― Walt
Whitman
“In the
faces of men and women, I see God.”
― Walt
Whitman
“I am
satisfied ... I see, dance, laugh, sing.
― 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
“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
“I act as
the tongue of you,
... tied
in your mouth . . . . in mine it begins to be loosened.”
― Walt
Whitman
“Give me
the splendid, silent sun with all his beams full-dazzling.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“The
future is no more uncertain than the present.”
― Walt
Whitman
“I do not
ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.”
― Walt
Whitman, Song of Myself
“A
morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.”
― Walt
Whitman
“I exist
as I am, that is enough.”
― Walt
Whitman
“This
hour I tell things in confidence/ I might not tell everybody, but I will tell
you.”
― Walt
Whitman
“I tramp
a perpetual journey.”
― Walt
Whitman, Song of Myself
“Stop
this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,
You shall
possess the good of the earth and sun.... there are millions of suns left,
You shall
no longer take things at second or third hand.... nor look through the eyes of
the dead.... nor feed on the spectres in books,
You shall
not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall
listen to all sides and filter them from yourself.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass: The First (1855) Edition
“I am too
not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable,
I sound
my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“A writer
can do nothing for men more necessary, satisfying, than just simply to reveal
to them the infinite possibility of their own souls.”
― 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.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“I will
sleep no more but arise, You oceans that have been calm within me! how I feel
you, fathomless, stirring, preparing unprecedented waves and storms.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“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, and the fields beyond, where the child, leaving his bed,
wander’d
alone,
bare-headed, barefoot,
Down from
the shower’d halo,
Up from
the mystic play of shadows, twining and twisting as if they were alive,
Out from
the patches of briers and blackberries,
From the
memories of the bird that chanted to me,
From your
memories, sad brother—from the fitful risings and fallings I heard,
From
under that yellow half-moon, late-risen, and swollen as if with tears,
From
those beginning notes of sickness and love, there in the transparent mist,
From the
thousand responses of my heart, never to cease,
From the
myriad thence-arous’d words,
From the
word stronger and more delicious than any,
From
such, as now they start, the scene revisiting,
As a
flock, twittering, rising, or overhead passing,
Borne
hither—ere all eludes me, hurriedly,
A man—yet
by these tears a little boy again,
Throwing myself
on the sand, confronting the waves,
I,
chanter of pains and joys, uniter of here and hereafter,
Taking
all hints to use them—but swiftly leaping beyond them,
A
reminiscence sing. ”
― Walt
Whitman, Song of Myself
“The
question, O me! so sad, recurring -
What good
amid these, O me, O life?
That you
are here - that life
exists
and identity,
that the
powerful play goes on,
and you
may contribute a verse.”
― Walt
Whitman, The Leaves of Grass
The mark
of a true writer is their ability to mystify the familiar and familiarize the
strange.”
― Walt
Whitman
“Stranger,
if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to
me?
And why
should I not speak to you?”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“And I
will show that there is no imperfection in the present, and
can be
none in the future,
And I
will show that whatever happens to anybody it may be turn'd to
beautiful
results,
And I
will show that nothing can happen more beautiful than death,
And I
will thread a thread through my poems that time and events are
compact,
And that
all the things of the universe are perfect miracles, each
as
profound as any.”
― Walt
Whitman
“Be not
dishearten'd -- Affection shall solve the problems of Freedom yet;
Those who
love each other shall become invincible.”
― Walt
Whitman
“What
shall I give? and which are my miracles?
2.
Realism is mine--my miracles--Take freely,
Take
without end--I offer them to you wherever your feet can carry you or your eyes
reach.
3. Why!
who makes much of a miracle?
As to me,
I know of nothing else but miracles,
Whether I
walk the streets of Manhattan,
Or dart my
sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky,
Or wade
with naked feet along the beach, just in the edge of the water,
Or stand
under trees in the woods,
Or talk
by day with any one I love--or sleep in the bed at night with any
one I
love,
Or sit at
the table at dinner with my mother,
Or look
at strangers opposite me riding in the car,
Or watch
honey-bees busy around the hive, of a summer forenoon,
Or
animals feeding in the fields,
Or
birds--or the wonderfulness of insects in the air,
Or the
wonderfulness of the sundown--or of stars shining so quiet and bright,
Or the
exquisite, delicate, thin curve of the new moon in spring;
Or
whether I go among those I like best, and that like me best--mechanics,
boatmen, farmers,
Or among
the savans--or to the _soiree_--or to the opera.
Or stand
a long while looking at the movements of machinery,
Or behold
children at their sports,
Or the
admirable sight of the perfect old man, or the perfect old woman,
Or the
sick in hospitals, or the dead carried to burial,
Or my own
eyes and figure in the glass;
These,
with the rest, one and all, are to me miracles,
The whole
referring--yet each distinct and in its place.
4. To me,
every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,
Every
inch of space is a miracle,
Every
square yard of the surface of the earth is spread with the same,
Every
cubic foot of the interior swarms with the same;
Every
spear of grass--the frames, limbs, organs, of men and women, and all that
concerns them,
All these
to me are unspeakably perfect miracles.
To me the
sea is a continual miracle;
The
fishes that swim--the rocks--the motion of the waves--the ships, with men in
them,
What
stranger miracles are there?”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“I will
You, in all, Myself, with promise to never desert you,
To which
I sign my name.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“Clear
and sweet is my soul, clear and sweet is all that is not my soul.”
― Walt
Whitman, Leaves of Grass
“keep
your face always toward the sunshine-and shadows will fall behind you.”
― Walt
Whitman
“I and
this mystery here we stand.”
― Walt
Whitman, Song of Myself
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