Come, said my Soul Such verses for my Body let us wr… That should I after death invisib… Or, long, long hence, in other sph… There to some group of mates the c…
One’s-Self I sing, a simple separ… Yet utter the word Democratic, th… Of physiology from top to toe I s… Not physiognomy alone nor brain al… The Female equally with the Male…
As I ponder’d in silence, Returning upon my poems, consideri… A Phantom arose before me, with d… Terrible in beauty, age, and power… The genius of poets of old lands,
In cabin’d ships at sea, The boundless blue on every side e… With whistling winds and music of… Or some lone bark buoy’d on the de… Where joyous full of faith, spread…
I heard that you ask’d for somethi… And to define America, her athlet… Therefore I send you my poems tha… wanted.
You who celebrate bygones, Who have explored the outward, the… has exhibited itself, Who have treated of man as the cre… and priests,
To thee old cause! Thou peerless, passionate, good ca… Thou stern, remorseless, sweet ide… Deathless throughout the ages, rac… After a strange sad war, great war…
I met a seer, Passing the hues and objects of th… The fields of art and learning, pl… To glean eidolons. Put in thy chants said he,
For him I sing, I raise the present on the past, (As some perennial tree out of its… With time and space I him dilate… To make himself by them the law un…
When I read the book, the biograp… And is this then (said I) what th… And so will some one when I am de… (As if any man really knew aught o… Why even I myself I often think k…
Beginning my studies the first ste… The mere fact consciousness, these… The least insect or animal, the se… The first step I say awed me and… I have hardly gone and hardly wish…
How they are provided for upon the… How they inure to themselves as mu… appears their age, How people respond to them, yet kn… How there is something relentless…
To The States, or any one of them… Resist much, obey little; Once unquestioning obedience, once… Once fully enslaved, no nation, st…
On journeys through the States we… (Ay, through the world—urged by th… Sailing henceforth to every land—t… We, willing learners of all, teach… We have watch’d the seasons dispen…
Here, take this gift, I was reserving it for some hero,… One who should serve the good old… Some brave confronter of despots,… But I see that what I was reservi…
Me imperturbe, standing at ease in… Master of all, or mistress of all—… of irrational things, Imbued as they—passive, receptive,… Finding my occupation, poverty, no…
THITHER, as I look, I see each… nestling close, always obligated; Thither hours, months, years—thith… establishments, even the most minu… Thither every-day life, speech, ut…
Lo! The unbounded sea! On its breast a Ship starting, sp… Ship, carrying even her moonsails; The pennant is flying aloft, as sh… below, emulous waves press forward…
I hear America singing, the varie… Those of mechanics, each one singi… The carpenter singing his as he me… The mason singing his as he makes… The boatman singing what belongs t…
What place is besieged, and vainly… Lo! I send to that place a comman… And with him horse and foot—and pa… And artillery-men, the deadliest t…
Still though the one I sing, (One, yet of contradictions made,)… I leave in him revolt, (O latent… indispensable fire!)
Shut not your doors to me proud li… For that which was lacking on all… most, I bring, Forth from the war emerging, a boo… The words of my book nothing, the…
Poets to come! orators, singers, m… Not to-day is to justify me, and a… But you, a new brood, native, athl… Arouse! Arouse—for you must justi… I myself but write one or two indi…
Stranger! if you, passing, meet me… speak to me, why should you not sp… And why should I not speak to you…
Thou reader throbbest life and pri… Therefore for thee the following c…
Starting from fish-shape Paumanok… Well-begotten, and rais’d by a per… After roaming many lands, lover of… Dweller in Mannahatta my city, or… Or a soldier camp’d or carrying my…
I celebrate myself, and sing mysel… And what I assume you shall assum… For every atom belonging to me as… I loafe and invite my soul, I lean and loafe at my ease observ…
37 You laggards there on guard! look… In at the conquer’d doors they cro… Embody all presences outlaw’d or s… See myself in prison shaped like a…
To the garden, the world, anew asc… Potent mates, daughters, sons, pre… The love, the life of their bodies… Curious, here behold my resurrecti… The revolving cycles, in their wid…
From pent-up, aching rivers; From that of myself, without which… From what I am determin’d to make… among men; From my own voice resonant—singing…
I sing the body electric, The armies of those I love engirt… They will not let me off till I g… And discorrupt them, and charge th… Was it doubted that those who corr…
A Woman waits for me—she contains… Yet all were lacking, if sex were… right man were lacking. Sex contains all, Bodies, Souls, meanings, proofs,…
Spontaneous me, Nature, The loving day, the mounting sun,… The arm of my friend hanging idly… The hill-side whiten’d with blosso… The same, late in autumn—the hues…
One hour to madness and joy! O furious! O confine me not! (What is this that frees me so in… What do my shouts amid lightnings… O to drink the mystic deliria deep…
Out of the rolling ocean the crowd… Whispering, I love you, before lo… I have travell’d a long way merely… For I could not die till I once l… For I fear’d I might afterward lo…
Ages and ages returning at interva… Undestroy’d, wandering immortal, Lusty, phallic, with the potent or… I, chanter of Adamic songs, Through the new garden the West,…
We two, how long we were fool’d, Now transmuted, we swiftly escape… We are Nature, long have we been… We become plants, trunks, foliage,… We are bedded in the ground, we ar…
O hymen! O hymenee! why do you ta… O why sting me for a swift moment… Why can you not continue? O why d… Is it because if you continued bey… soon certainly kill me?
I am he that aches with amorous lo… Does the earth gravitate? Does no… matter? So the Body of me, to all I meet,…
Native moments—when you come upon… Give me now libidinous joys only, Give me the drench of my passions,… To-day I go consort with Nature’s… I am for those who believe in loos…
Once I pass’d through a populous… use with its shows, architecture,… Yet now of all that city I rememb… who detain’d me for love of me, Day by day and night by night we w…
I heard you solemn-sweet pipes of… pass’d the church, Winds of autumn, as I walk’d the… stretch’d sighs up above so mournf… I heard the perfect Italian tenor…
Facing west, from California’s sh… Inquiring, tireless, seeking what… I, a child, very old, over waves,… land of migrations, look afar, Look off the shores of my Western…
As Adam, early in the morning, Walking forth from the bower, refr… Behold me where I pass—hear my vo… Touch me—touch the palm of your ha… Be not afraid of my Body.
In paths untrodden, In the growth by margins of pond-w… Escaped from the lite that exhibit… From all the standards hitherto pu… conformities,
Scented herbage of my breast, Leaves from you I yield, I write,… Tomb-leaves, body-leaves, growing… Perennial roots, tall leaves—O th… delicate leaves,
Whoever you are holding me now in… Without one thing all will be usel… I give you fair warning before you… I am not what you supposed, but fa… Who is he that would become my fol…
Come, I will make the continent i… I will make the most splendid race… I will make divine magnetic lands, With the love of comrades, With the life—long love of comrade…
These I singing in spring collect… (For who but I should understand… And who but I should be the poet… Collecting I traverse the garden… Now along the pond-side, now wadin…
Not heaving from my ribb’d breast… Not in sighs at night, in rage, di… Not in those long-drawn, ill-suppr… Not in many an oath and promise br… Not in my wilful and savage soul’s…
Of the terrible doubt of appearanc… Of the uncertainty after all—that… That may-be reliance and hope are… That may-be identity beyond the gr… May-be the things I perceive—the…
And now, gentlemen, A word I give to remain in your m… As base, and finale too, for all m… (So, to the students, the old prof… At the close of his crowded course…
Recorders ages hence! Come, I will take you down undern… tell you what to say of me; Publish my name and hang up my pic… lover,
When I heard at the close of the… with plaudits in the capitol, stil… follow’d, And else when I carous’d, or when… was not happy,
Are you the new person drawn towar… To begin with take warning, I am… Do you suppose you will find in me… Do you think it so easy to have me… Do you think the friendship me wou…
Roots and leaves themselves alone… Scents brought to men and women fr… pond-side, Breast-sorrel and pinks of love—fi… than vines,
Not heat flames up and consumes, Not sea-waves hurry in and out, Not the air, delicious and dry, th… lightly along white down-balls of… Wafted, sailing gracefully, to dro…
Trickle drops! my blue veins leavi… O drops of me! trickle, slow drops… Candid from me falling, drip, blee… From wounds made to free you whenc… From my face, from my forehead and…
City of orgies, walks and joys! City whom that I have lived and s… you illustrious, Not the pageants of you—not your s… repay me;
Behold this swarthy face—these gra… This beard—the white wool, unclipt… My brown hands, and the silent man… Yet comes one, a Manhattanese, an… on the lips with robust love,
