Leaves of Grass: First and Death-Bed Editions

by Walt Whitman

  punctually come forever and ever.

  And as to you death, and you bitter hug of mortality .... it is idle to try to alarm me.

  To his work without flinching the accoucheurvcomes,

  I see the elderhand pressing receiving supporting,

  I recline by the sills of the exquisite flexible doors .... and mark

  the outlet, and mark the relief and escape.

  And as to you corpse I think you are good manure, but that does

  not offend me,

  I smell the white roses sweetscented and growing,

  I reach to the leafy lips .... I reach to the polished breasts of

  melons,

  And as to you life, I reckon you are the leavings of many deaths,

  No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before.

  I hear you whispering there O stars of heaven,

  O suns .... O grass of graves .... O perpetual transfers and

  promotions .... if you do not say anything how can I say

  anything?

  Of the turbid pool that lies in the autumn forest,

  Of the moon that descends the steeps of the soughing twilight,

  Toss, sparkles of day and dusk .... toss on the black stems that

  decay in the muck,

  Toss to the moaning gibberish of the dry limbs.

  I ascend from the moon .... I ascend from the night,

  And perceive of the ghastly glitter the sunbeams reflected,

  And debouch to the steady and central from the offspring great or

  small.

  There is that in me .... I do not know what it is .... but I know it is in me.

  Wrenched and sweaty .... calm and cool then my body becomes; I sleep .... I sleep long.

  I do not know it .... it is without name .... it is a word

  unsaid,

  It is not in any dictionary or utterance or symbol.

  Something it swings on more than the earth I swing on,

  To it the creation is the friend whose embracing awakes me.

  Perhaps I might tell more .... Outlines! I plead for my brothers and sisters.

  Do you see O my brothers and sisters?

  It is not chaos or death .... it is form and union and plan .... it

  is eternal life .... it is happiness.

  The past and present wilt .... I have filled them and emptied

  them,

  And proceed to fill my next fold of the future.

  Listener up there! Here you .... what have you to confide to me?

  Look in my face while I snuff the sidle of evening,

  Talk honestly, for no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute

  longer.

  Do I contradict myself?

  Very well then .... I contradict myself;

  I am large .... I contain multitudes.

  I concentrate toward them that are nigh .... I wait on the door-slab.

  Who has done his day’s work and will soonest be through with his

  supper?

  Who wishes to walk with me?

  Will you speak before I am gone? Will you prove already too late?

  The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me .... he complains of my gab and my loitering.

  I too am not a bit tamed .... I too am untranslatable,

  I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.29

  The last scud of day holds back for me,

  It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadowed

  wilds,

  It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.

  I depart as air .... I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,

  I effuse my flesh in eddies and drift it in lacy jags.

  I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,

  If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.

  You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,

  But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,

  And filter and fibre your blood.

  Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,

  Missing me one place search another,

  I stop some where waiting for you30

  [A Song for Occupations]

  COME closer to me,

  Push close my lovers and take the best I possess,

  Yield closer and closer and give me the best you possess.

  This is unfinished business with me .... how is it with you?

  I was chilled with the cold types and cylinder and wet paper

  between us.

  I pass so poorly with paper and types31.... I must pass with the

  contact of bodies and souls.

  I do not thank you for liking me as I am, and liking the touch of

  me .... I know that it is good for you to do so.

  Were all educations practical and ornamental well displayed out

  of me, what would it amount to?

  Were I as the head teacher or charitable proprietor or wise

  statesman, what would it amount to?

  Were I to you as the boss employing and paying you, would that

  satisfy you?

  The learned and virtuous and benevolent, and the usual terms;

  A man like me, and never the usual terms.

  Neither a servant nor a master am I,

  I take no sooner a large price than a small price .... I will have

  my own whoever enjoys me,

  I will be even with you, and you shall be even with me.

  If you are a workman or workwoman I stand as nigh as the

  nighest that works in the same shop,

  If you bestow gifts on your brother or dearest friend, I demand as

  good as your brother or dearest friend,

  If your lover or husband or wife is welcome by day or night, I

  must be personally as welcome;

  If you have become degraded or ill, then I will become so for

  your sake;

  If you remember your foolish and outlawed deeds, do you think I

  cannot remember my foolish and outlawed deeds?

  If you carouse at the table I say I will carouse at the opposite side

  of the table;

  If you meet some stranger in the street and love him or her, do I

  not often meet strangers in the street and love them?

  If you see a good deal remarkable in me I see just as much

  remarkable in you.

  Why what have you thought of yourself?

  Is it you then that thought yourself less?

  Is it you that thought the President greater than you? or the rich

  better off than you? or the educated wiser than you?

  Because you are greasy or pimpled—or that you was once drunk, or a thief, or diseased, or rheumatic, or a prostitute—or are so now—or from frivolity or impotence—or that you are no scholar, and never saw your name in print .... do you give in that you are any less immortal?

  Souls of men and women! it is not you I call unseen, unheard,

  untouchable and untouching;

  It is not you I go argue pro and con about, and to settle whether

  you are alive or no;

  I own publicly who you are, if nobody else owns .... and see and

  hear you, and what you give and take;

  What is there you cannot give and take?

  I see not merely that you are polite or whitefaced .... married or

  single .... citizens of old states or citizens of new states ....

  eminent in some profession .... a lady or gentleman in a

  parlor .... or dressed in the jail uniform .... or pulpit

  uniform,

  Not only the free Utahan, Kansian, or Arkansian .... not only the

  free Cuban ... not merely the slave .... not Mexican native,

  or Flatfoot, or negro from Africa,

  Iroquois eating the warflesh—fishtearer in his lair of rocks and

  sand .... Esquimaux in the dark cold snowhous
e ....

  Chinese with his transverse eyes .... Bedowee—or wandering

  nomad—or tabounschikw at the head of his droves,

  Grown, half-grown, and babe—of this country and every country,

  indoors and outdoors I see .... and all else is behind or

  through them.

  The wife—and she is not one jot less than the husband,

  The daughter—and she is just as good as the son,

  The mother—and she is every bit as much as the father.

  Offspring of those not rich—boys apprenticed to trades,

  Young fellows working on farms and old fellows working on farms;

  The naive .... the simple and hardy .... he going to the polls

  to vote .... he who has a good time, and he who has a bad

  time;

  Mechanics, southerners, new arrivals, sailors, mano‘warsmen,

  merchantmen, coasters,

  All these I see .... but nigher and farther the same I see;

  None shall escape me, and none shall wish to escape me.

  I bring what you much need, yet always have,

  I bring not money or amours or dress or eating .... but I bring as

  good;

  And send no agent or riiedium .... and offer no representative of

  value—but offer the value itself.

  There is something that comes home to one now and perpetually,

  It is not what is printed or preached or discussed .... it eludes

  discussion and print,

  It is not to be put in a book .... it is not in this book,

  It is for you whoever you are .... it is no farther from you than

  your hearing and sight are from you,

  It is hinted by nearest and commonest and readiest .... it is not

  them, though it is endlessly provoked by them .... What is

  there ready and near you now?

  You may read in many languages and read nothing about it;

  You may read the President’s message and read nothing about it

  there;

  Nothing in the reports from the state department or treasury

  department .... or in the daily papers, or the weekly papers,

  Or in the census returns or assessors’ returns or prices current or

  any accounts of stock.

  The sun and stars that float in the open air .... the appleshaped

  earth and we upon it .... surely the drift of them is

  something grand;

  I do not know what it is except that it is grand, and that it is

  happiness,

  And that the enclosing purport of us here is not a speculation,

  or bon-mot or reconnoissance,

  And that it is not something which by luck may turn out well for

  us, and without luck must be a failure for us,

  And not something which may yet be retracted in a certain

  contingency.

  The light and shade—the curious sense of body and identity—the

  greed that with perfect complaisance devours all things—the

  endless pride and outstretching of man—unspeakable joys

  and sorrows,

  The wonder every one sees in every one else he sees .... and the

  wonders that fill each minute of time forever and each acre of

  surface and space forever,

  Have you reckoned them as mainly for a trade or farmwork? or for

  the profits of a store? or to achieve yourself a position? or to

  fill a gentleman’s leisure or a lady’s leisure?

  Have you reckoned the landscape took substance and form that it

  might be painted in a picture?

  Or men and women that they might be written of, and songs sung?

  Or the attraction of gravity and the great laws and harmonious

  combinations and the fluids of the air as subjects for the

  savans?

  Or the brown land and the blue sea for maps and charts?

  Or the stars to be put in constellations and named fancy names?

  Or that the growth of seeds is for agricultural tables or agriculture

  itself?

  Old institutions .... these arts libraries legends collections—and the practice handed along in manufactures .... will we rate them so high?

  Will we rate our prudence and business so high? .... I have no

  objection,

  I rate them as high as the highest .... but a child born of a

  woman and man I rate beyond all rate.

  We thought our Union grand and our Constitution grand;

  I do not say they are not grand and good—for they are,

  I am this day just as much in love with them as you,

  But I am eternally in love with you and with all my fellows upon

  the earth.

  We consider the bibles and religions divine .... I do not say they

  are not divine,

  I say they have all grown out of you and may grow out of you

  still,

  It is not they who give the life .... it is you who give the life;

  Leaves are not more shed from the trees or trees from the earth

  than they are shed out of you.

  The sum of all known value and respect I add up in you whoever

  you are;

  The President is up there in the White House for you .... it is

  not you who are here for him,

  The Secretaries act in their bureaus for you .... not you here for

  them,

  The Congress convenes every December for you,

  Laws, courts, the forming of states, the charters of cities, the going

  and coming of commerce and mails are all for you.

  All doctrines, all politics and civilization exurge from you,

  All sculpture and monuments and anything inscribed anywhere

  are tallied in you,

  The gist of histories and statistics as far back as the records reach

  is in you this hour—and myths and tales the same;

  If you were not breathing and walking here where would they all

  be?

  The most renowned poems would be ashes .... orations and

  plays would be vacuums.

  All architecture is what you do to it when you look upon it;

  Did you think it was in the white or gray stone? or the lines of the

  arches and cornices?

  All music is what awakens from you when you are reminded by

  the instruments,

  It is not the violins and the cornets .... it is not the oboe nor the

  beating drums—nor the notes of the baritone singer singing

  his sweet romanza .... nor those of the men’s chorus, nor

  those of the women’s chorus,

  It is nearer and farther than they.

  Will the whole come back then?

  Can each see the signs of the best by a look in the lookingglass? Is

  there nothing greater or more?

  Does all sit there with you and here with me?

  The old forever new things .... you foolish child! .... the closest

  simplest things—this moment with you,

  Your person and every particle that relates to your person,

  The pulses of your brain waiting their chance and

  encouragement at every deed or sight;

  Anything you do in public by day, and anything you do in secret

  betweendays,

  What is called right and what is called wrong .... what you

  behold or touch .... what causes your anger or wonder,

  The anklechain of the slave, the bed of the bedhouse, the cards of

  the gambler, the plates of the forger;

  What is seen or learned in the street, or intuitively learned,

  What is learned in the public school—spelling, reading, writing

  and ciphering .... the blackboard a
nd the teacher’s diagrams:

  The panes of the windows and all that appears through them ....

  the going forth in the morning and the aimless spending of

  the day;

  (What is it that you made money? what is it that you got what you

  wanted?)

  The usual routine .... the workshop, factory, yard, office, store,

  or desk;

  The jaunt of hunting or fishing, or the life of hunting or fishing,

  Pasturelife, foddering, milking and herding, and all the personnel

  and usages;

  The plum-orchard and apple-orchard .... gardening ....

  seedlings, cuttings, flowers and vines,

  Grains and manures.. marl, clay, loam .. the subsoil plough .. the

  shovel and pick and rake and hoe .. irrigation and draining;

  The currycomb .. the horse-cloth .. the halter and bridle and

  bits .. the very wisps of straw,

  The barn and barn-yard .. the bins and mangers.. the mows and

  racks:

  Manufactures.. commerce .. engineering .. the building of

  cities, and every trade carried on there .. and the implements

  of every trade,

  The anvil and tongs and hammer.. the axe and wedge .. the

  square and mitre and jointer and smoothingplane;

  The plumbob and trowel and level .. the wall-scaffold, and the

  work of walls and ceilings .. or any mason-work:

  The ship’s compass .. the sailor’s tarpaulin .. the stays and

  lanyards, and the ground-tackle for anchoring or mooring,

  The sloop’s tiller .. the pilot’s wheel and bell .. the yacht or fish

  smack .. the great gay-pennanted three-hundred-foot

  steamboat under full headway, with her proud fat breasts and

  her delicate swift-flashing paddles;

  The trail and line and hooks and sinkers.. the seine, and hauling

  the seine;

  Smallarms and rifles .... the powder and shot and caps and

  wadding .... the ordnance for war .... the carriages: