Quotes from Walt Whitman

seems to me that everything in the light and air ought to be happy; Whoever is not in his coffin and the dark grave, let him know he has enough.

AS THE TIME DRAWS NIGH As the time draws nigh, glooming, a cloud, A dread beyond, of I know not what, darkens me. I shall go forth, I shall traverse The States awhile—but I cannot tell whither or how long; Perhaps soon, some day or night while I am singing, my voice will suddenly cease. O book, O chants! must all then amount to but this? Must we barely arrive at this beginning of us?… And yet it is enough, O soul! O soul! we have positively appear'd—that is enough.

O harsh surrounding cloud that will not free my soul.

Whoever degrades another degrades me, And whatever is done or said returns at last to me. Through me the afflatus surging and surging, through me the current and index. I speak the pass-word primeval, I give the sign of democracy, By God! I will accept nothing which all cannot have their counterpart of on the same terms.

Easter will soon be here. Life breaks into beauty again and we realize that man may bring hell itself into the world, but that Nature ever patiently waits to be his natural paradise.

Quicksand years that whirl me I know not whither, Your schemes, politics, fail, lines give way, substances mock and elude me, Only the theme I sing, the great and strong-possess'd soul, eludes not, One's-self must never give way—that is the final substance— that out of all is sure, Out of politics, triumphs, battles, life, what at last finally remains? When shows break up what but One's-Self is sure?

Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you, You must travel it for yourself.

I think I will do nothing for a long time but listen, / And accrue what I hear into myself....and let sounds contribute / toward me.

Love, that is the pulse of all, the sustenance and the pang […] No other theme but love—knitting, enclosing, all-diffusing love. — Walt Whitman, from "The Mystic Trumpeter", Leaves of Grass (Simon Schuster, August 1st 2006) Originally published July 4th 1855.

Wonderful to depart! Wonderful to be here! The heart, to jet the all-alike and innocent blood! To breathe the air, how delicious! To speak—to walk—to seize something by the hand! To prepare for sleep, for bed, to look on my rose-color'd flesh! To be conscious of my body, so satisfied, so large! To be this incredible God I am! To have gone forth among other Gods, these men and women I love. - from Song at Sunset

This minute that comes to me over the past Decillions. There is no better than it And now. What behaves well In the past or behaves well To-day is not such a wonder. The wonder is always and Always how there can be A mean man or an infidel.

When I read the book, the biography famous, And is this then (said I) what the author calls a man's life? And so will some one when I am dead and gone write my life? (As if any man really knew aught my life, Why even I myself I often think know little or nothing of my real life, Only a few hints, a few diffused faint clews and indirections I seek for my own use to trace out here.)