What blurt is this about virtue and about vice? Evil propels me, and reform of evil propels me--I stand indif ferent; My gait is no fault-finder's or rejecter's gait; I moisten the roots of all that has grown. 460 Did you fear some scrofula out of the unflagging pregnancy? Did you guess the celestial laws are yet to be work'd over and rectified? I find one side a balance,' and the antipodal side a balance; Thoughts and deeds of the present, our rouse and early start. This minute that comes to me over the past decillions, What behaved well in the past, or behaves well to-day, is not such a wonder; 470 The wonder is, always and always, how there can be a mean man or an infidel. 23 Endless unfolding of words of ages! And mine a word of the modern-the2 word En-Masse. A word of the faith that never balks; Here or henceforward, it is all the same to me-I accept Time, absolutely." It alone is without flaw-it rounds and completes all ;* 1 1855 '56 '60 read "I step up to say that what we do is right and what we affirm is right-and some is only the ore of right. Witness of us, one side a balance," etc. 2 1855 '56 '60 read a word.” 3 1855 '56 '60 read "One time as good as another, here or henceforward it is all the same to me." Lines 476-7 added in 1867. 5 1855'56 '60 read "a word for reality, materialism first and last imbuing." Hurrah for positive science! long live exact demonstration! 480 Fetch stonecrop, mixt with cedar and branches of lilac; This is the lexicographer-this the' chemist—this made a grammar of the old cartouches; These mariners put the ship through dangerous unknown seas; This is the geologist-this works with the scalpel—and this is a mathematician. Gentlemen! to you the first honors always : Your facts are useful and real-and yet they are not my dwelling; (I but enter by them to an area of my dwelling.) Less the reminders of properties told, my words; And more the reminders, they, of life untold, and of freedom and extrication, And make short account of neuters and geldings, and favor men and women fully equipt, 490 And beat the gong of revolt, and stop with fugitives, and them that plot and conspire. 24 Walt Whitman am I, a Kosmos, of mighty Manhattan the son,* Turbulent, fleshy and sensual, eating, drinking and breeding; No sentimentalist-no stander above men and women, or apart from them; No more modest than immodest. Unscrew the locks from the doors! Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs! Whoever degrades another degrades me; And whatever is done or said returns at last to me." 1 1855 reads "lexicographer or chemist." 2 1855 '56 '60 read "Gentlemen! I receive you and attach and clasp hands with you, The facts are useful and real-they are not my dwelling-I enter by them to an area of the dwelling." 3 1855 '56 '60 read "I am less the reminder of property or qualities, and more the reminder of life, And go on the square for my own sake and for others' sakes.” * 1855'56 '60 read Walt Whitman, an American, one of the roughs, a Kosmos." 1867 reads "Walt Whitman am I, of mighty Manhattan the son." 5 1855 '56 '60 read "Disorderly.” 6 1855 '56 '60. After line 499 read "And whatever I do or say I also re Through me the afflatus surging and surging-through me the current and index. 500 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. Through me many long dumb voices; Voices of the interminable generations of slaves; Voices of the diseas'd and despairing, and of thieves and dwarfs ; And of the threads that connect the stars-and of wombs, and of the father-stuff, And of the rights of them the others are down upon; Of the trivial, flat, foolish, despised, Fog in the air, beetles rolling balls of dung. Through me forbidden voices; 510 Voice of sexes and lusts-voices veil'd, and I remove the veil ; Voices indecent, by me clarified and transfigur'd. I do not press my fingers across my mouth; I keep as delicate around the bowels as around the head and heart; Copulation is no more rank to me than death is. I believe in the flesh and the appetites; Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle. Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch'd from; The scent of these arm-pits, aroma finer than prayer ; 520 If I worship one thing more than another, it shall be the spread of my own body, or any part of it.' 1 1855 reads "This head is more than churches or bibles or creeds." 1866 reads This head is more than churches, bibles, creeds." 21855'56 '60 read "If I worship any particular thing, it shall be some of the spread of my own body." Translucent mould of me, it shall be you! Firm masculine colter, it shall be you. Whatever goes to the tilth of me, it shall be you! You my rich blood! Your milky stream, pale strippings of my life. Breast that presses against other breasts, it shall be you! 530 Root of wash'd sweet flag! timorous pond-snipe! nest of guarded duplicate eggs! it shall be you! Mix'd tussled hay of head, beard, brawn, it shall be you! Trickling sap of maple fibre of manly wheat! it shall be you! Sun so generous, it shall be you! Vapors lighting and shading my face, it shall be you! You sweaty brooks and dews, it shall be you! Winds whose soft-tickling genitals rub against me, it shall be you! Broad, muscular fields! branches of live oak! loving lounger in my winding paths! it shall be you! Hands I have taken-face I have kiss'd-mortal I have ever touch'd it shall be you. I dote on myself there is that lot of me, and all so lus cious; Each moment, and whatever happens, thrills me with joy. O I am wonderful!" 540 I cannot tell how my ankles bend, nor whence the cause of my faintest wish; Nor the cause of the friendship I emit, nor the cause of the friendship I take again. That I walk up my stoop ! I pause to consider if it really be ;* A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books. 1 "it shall be you" added in 1860. 2 Line 542 added in 1860, which reads, "OI am so wonderful." 3 1855 '56 read “To walk up my stoop is unaccountable,” etc. 1855 '56 '60. After line 545 read "That I eat and drink is spectacle enough for the great authors and schools." To behold the day-break! The little light fades the immense and diaphanous shadows; Hefts of the moving world, at innocent gambols, silently rising, freshly exuding, Scooting obliquely high and low. Something I cannot see puts upward libidinous prongs; 550 The earth by the sky staid with the daily close of their junction; The heav'd challenge from the east that moment over my head; The mocking taunt, See then whether you shall be master! 25 Dazzling and tremendous, how quick the sun-rise would kill me, If I could not now and always send sun-rise out of me. We also ascend, dazzling and tremendous as the sun; We found our own, O' my Soul, in the calm and cool of the daybreak. My voice goes after what my eyes cannot reach; 560 With the twirl of my tongue I encompass worlds, and volumes of worlds. Speech is the twin of my vision-it is unequal to measure itself; It provokes me forever; It says sarcastically, Walt, you contain enough—why don't you let it out, then? Come now, I will not be tantalized-you conceive too much of articulation. Do you not know, O speech, how the buds beneath you are folded? Waiting in gloom, protected by frost ; The dirt receding before my prophetical screams; 1 "O" added in 1860. * 1855'56 '60 read "Walt, you understand enough," etc. 66 |