Walt Whitman - The Complete Works of Walt Whitman

Boss, spotter, starter, hostler, somebody loafing on you, you

loafing on somebody, headway, man before and man behind,

Good day’s work, bad day’s work, pet stock, mean stock, first out,

last out, turning-in at night,

To think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers, and he

there takes no interest in them.

5

The markets, the government, the working-man’s wages, to think what

account they are through our nights and days,

To think that other working-men will make just as great account of

them, yet we make little or no account.

The vulgar and the refined, what you call sin and what you call

goodness, to think how wide a difference,

To think the difference will still continue to others, yet we lie

beyond the difference.

To think how much pleasure there is,

Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in business? or

planning a nomination and election? or with your wife and family?

Or with your mother and sisters? or in womanly housework? or the

beautiful maternal cares?

These also flow onward to others, you and I flow onward,

But in due time you and I shall take less interest in them.

Your farm, profits, crops — to think how engross’d you are,

To think there will still be farms, profits, crops, yet for you of

what avail?

6

What will be will be well, for what is is well,

To take interest is well, and not to take interest shall be well.

The domestic joys, the dally housework or business, the building of

houses, are not phantasms, they have weight, form, location,

Farms, profits, crops, markets, wages, government, are none of them

phantasms,

The difference between sin and goodness is no delusion,

The earth is not an echo, man and his life and all the things of his

life are well-consider’d.

You are not thrown to the winds, you gather certainly and safely

around yourself,

Yourself! yourself!. yourself, for ever and ever!

7

It is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and

father, it is to identify you,

It is not that you should be undecided, but that you should be decided,

Something long preparing and formless is arrived and form’d in you,

You are henceforth secure, whatever comes or goes.

The threads that were spun are gather’d, the wet crosses the warp,

the pattern is systematic.

The preparations have every one been justified,

The orchestra have sufficiently tuned their instruments, the baton

has given the signal.

The guest that was coming, he waited long, he is now housed,

He is one of those who are beautiful and happy, he is one of those

that to look upon and be with is enough.

The law of the past cannot be eluded,

The law of the present and future cannot be eluded,

The law of the living cannot be eluded, it is eternal,

The law of promotion and transformation cannot be eluded,

The law of heroes and good-doers cannot be eluded,

The law of drunkards, informers, mean persons, not one iota thereof

can be eluded.

8

Slow moving and black lines go ceaselessly over the earth,

Northerner goes carried and Southerner goes carried, and they on the

Atlantic side and they on the Pacific,

And they between, and all through the Mississippi country, and all

over the earth.

The great masters and kosmos are well as they go, the heroes and

good-doers are well,

The known leaders and inventors and the rich owners and pious and

distinguish’d may be well,

But there is more account than that, there is strict account of all.

The interminable hordes of the ignorant and wicked are not nothing,

The barbarians of Africa and Asia are not nothing,

The perpetual successions of shallow people are not nothing as they go.

Of and in all these things,

I have dream’d that we are not to be changed so much, nor the law of

us changed,

I have dream’d that heroes and good-doers shall be under the present

and past law,

And that murderers, drunkards, liars, shall be under the present and

past law,

For I have dream’d that the law they are under now is enough.

And I have dream’d that the purpose and essence of the known life,

the transient,

Is to form and decide identity for the unknown life, the permanent.

If all came but to ashes of dung,

If maggots and rats ended us, then Alarum! for we are betray’d,

Then indeed suspicion of death.

Do you suspect death? if I were to suspect death I should die now,

Do you think I could walk pleasantly and well-suited toward annihilation?

Pleasantly and well-suited I walk,

Whither I walk I cannot define, but I know it is good,

The whole universe indicates that it is good,

The past and the present indicate that it is good.

How beautiful and perfect are the animals!

How perfect the earth, and the minutest thing upon it!

What is called good is perfect, and what is called bad is just as perfect,

The vegetables and minerals are all perfect, and the imponderable

fluids perfect;

Slowly and surely they have pass’d on to this, and slowly and surely

they yet pass on.

9

I swear I think now that every thing without exception has an eternal soul!

The trees have, rooted in the ground! the weeds of the sea have! the

animals!

I swear I think there is nothing but immortality!

That the exquisite scheme is for it, and the nebulous float is for

it, and the cohering is for it!

And all preparation is for it — and identity is for it — and life and

materials are altogether for it!

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Darest thou now O soul,

Walk out with me toward the unknown region,

Where neither ground is for the feet nor any path to follow?

No map there, nor guide,

Nor voice sounding, nor touch of human hand,

Nor face with blooming flesh, nor lips, nor eyes, are in that land.

I know it not O soul,

Nor dost thou, all is a blank before us,

All waits undream’d of in that region, that inaccessible land.

Till when the ties loosen,

All but the ties eternal, Time and Space,

Nor darkness, gravitation, sense, nor any bounds bounding us.

Then we burst forth, we float,

In Time and Space O soul, prepared for them,

Equal, equipt at last, (O joy! O fruit of all!) them to fulfil O soul.

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Whispers of heavenly death murmur’d I hear,

Labial gossip of night, sibilant chorals,

Footsteps gently ascending, mystical breezes wafted soft and low,

Ripples of unseen rivers, tides of a current flowing, forever flowing,

(Or is it the plashing of tears? the measureless waters of human tears?)

I see, just see skyward, great cloud-masses,

Mournfully slowly they roll, silently swelling and mixing,

With at times a half-dimm’d sadden’d far-off star,

Appearing and disappearing.

(Some parturition rather, some solemn immortal birth;

On the frontiers to eyes impenetrable,

Some soul is passing over.)

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1

Chanting the square deific, out of the One advancing, out of the sides,

Out of the old and new, out of the square entirely divine,

Solid, four-sided, (all the sides needed,) from this side Jehovah am I,

Old Brahm I, and I Saturnius am;

Not Time affects me — I am Time, old, modern as any,