Walt Whitman Quotes - Page 18

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What is commonest and cheapest and nearest and easiest is Me, Me going in for my chances, spending for vast returns, Adorning myself to bestow myself on the first that will take me, Not asking the sky to come down to my goodwill, Scattering if freely forever.

Walt Whitman

Sky, Simplicity, Forever

Walt Whitman, Ezra Greenspan (2005). “Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself": A Sourcebook and Critical Edition”, p.53, Psychology Press

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Out of every fruition of success, no matter what, comes forth something to make a new effort necessary.

Walt Whitman

Success, Effort, Fruition

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Press close, bare-bosomed Night! Press close, magnetic,
nourishing Night!
Night of south winds! Night of the large, few stars!
Still, nodding Night! Mad, naked, Summer Night!

Walt Whitman

Summer, Stars, Night

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.27, NYU Press

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There is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe.

Walt Whitman

Squash, Little Things, Hub

Walt Whitman, David S. Reynolds (2005). “Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass”, p.42, Oxford University Press

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Future years will never know the seething hell and the black infernal background, the countless minor scenes and interiors of the secession war; and it is best they should not. The real war will never get in the books.

Walt Whitman

Memorial Day, Real, War

Walt Whitman (2012). “Specimen Days & Collect”, p.80, Courier Corporation

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Seasons pursuing each other the indescribable crowd is gathered, it is the fourth of Seventh-month, (what salutes of cannon and small arms!

Walt Whitman

Crowds, Arms, Festivals

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.19, NYU Press

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The orchestra whirls me wider than Uranus flies, It wrenches such ardors from me I did not know I possess'd them

Walt Whitman

Orchestra, Ardor, Wrenches

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.38, NYU Press

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In nothing is there more evolution than the American mind.

Walt Whitman

Mind, Progress, Evolution

Walt Whitman (1995). “Specimen Days: & Collect”, p.331, Courier Corporation

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Manhattan crowds, with their turbulent musical chorus! Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me.

Walt Whitman

New York, Eye, Forever

Walt Whitman, Howard Nelson (2010). “Earth, My Likeness: Nature Poetry of Walt Whitman”, p.82, North Atlantic Books

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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 alone rounds and completes all,
That mystic baffling wonder alone completes all.

Walt Whitman

Time, Wonder, Flaws

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.30, NYU Press

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The smallest sprout shows there is really no death. And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it.

Walt Whitman

Waiting, Doe, Leaves Of Grass

Walt Whitman (2009). “The Americanness of Walt Whitman”, p.5, Wildside Press LLC

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I will write the evangel-poem of comrades and of love.

Walt Whitman

Love, Friendship, Writing

Walt Whitman (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1860-1867”, p.278, NYU Press

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The work for giants...to serve well the guns!

Walt Whitman

Military, Gun, Giants

Walt Whitman (2013). “Leaves of Grass”, p.448, Simon and Schuster

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Dazzling and tremendous how quick the sun-rise would kill me, if I could not now and always send sun-rise out of me.

Walt Whitman

Sun, Kill Me, If I Could

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.35, NYU Press

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There was a child went forth every day, And the first object he looked upon, that object he became.

Walt Whitman

Children, Leaves Of Grass, Firsts

Walt Whitman (2011). “Leaves of Grass, 1860: The 150th Anniversary Facsimile Edition”, p.221, University of Iowa Press

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When I heard the learn’d astronomer; When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me; When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them; When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick; Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.

Walt Whitman

Time, Stars, Learning

Walt Whitman (2015). “Drum-Taps: The Complete 1865 Edition”, p.42, New York Review of Books

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Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.

Walt Whitman

Space, Miracle, Leaves Of Grass

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.256, NYU Press

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

Walt Whitman

Add, Values And Respect, Known

Walt Whitman (2013). “Walt Whitman: Selected Poems 1855-1892”, p.70, St. Martin's Press

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O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done, / The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won

Walt Whitman

Sailing, Done, Leaves Of Grass

"O Captain! My Captain!" l. 1 (1871)

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I mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning, How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn'd over upon me, And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my bare-stript heart, And reach'd till you felt my beard, and reach'd till you held my feet.

Walt Whitman

Summer, Morning, Heart

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.6, NYU Press

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I henceforth tread the world, chaste, temperate, an early riser, a steady grower.

Walt Whitman

World, Chaste, Steady

Walt Whitman (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1860-1867”, p.324, NYU Press

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What a devil art thou, Poverty! How many desires - how many aspirations after goodness and truth - how many noble thoughts, loving wishes toward our fellows, beautiful imaginings thou hast crushed under thy heel, without remorse or pause!

Walt Whitman

Beautiful, Art, Wish

Walt Whitman (1998). “The Journalism: 1834-1846”, Peter Lang Pub Incorporated

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I pass death with the dying and birth with the new-wash'd babe, and am not contained between my hat and my boots.

Walt Whitman

Dying, Boots, Leaves Of Grass

Walt Whitman, Sculley Bradley, Harold W. Blodgett (2008). “Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1855-1856”, p.8, NYU Press

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And as to you Death, and you bitter hug of mortality, it is idle to try to alarm me.... And as to you corpse, I think you are good manure, but that does not offend me, I smell the white roses sweet-scented 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.

Walt Whitman

Death, Sweet, Thinking

Walt Whitman, “Song Of Myself, XLIX”

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Under the specious pretext of effecting 'the happiness of the whole community,' nearly all the wrongs and intrusions of government has been carried through.

Walt Whitman

Government, Community, Intrusion

Walt Whitman (1998). “The Journalism: 1834-1846”, Peter Lang Pub Incorporated

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Born: May 31, 1819
Died: March 26, 1892
Occupation: Poet
Cite this Page: Citation

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