Of The Visage Of Things

Of the visages of things - And of piercing through to the accepted hells beneath;
Of ugliness - To me there is just as much in it as there is in beauty - And now the ugliness of human beings is acceptable to me;
Of detected persons - To me, detected persons are not, in any respect, worse than undetected persons - and are not in any respect worse than I am myself;
Of criminals - To me, any judge, or any juror, is equally criminal - and any reputable person is also - and the President is also

Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman was an American poet, essayist, and journalist, often considered one of the most influential poets in the American canon. His work broke the boundaries of poetic form and is known for its free verse style. Whitman’s most famous collection, 'Leaves of Grass', celebrates democracy, nature, love, and friendship. He had a significant impact on later literary traditions and is often referred to as the father of free verse.

Walt Whitman

In Former Songs

Walt Whitman, Simple Poetry

Cavalry Crossing A Ford

Walt Whitman, Simple Poetry

Mannahatta

Walt Whitman, Simple Poetry

In Cabin'd Ships At Sea

Walt Whitman, Simple Poetry

English

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You Felons On Trial In Courts

You felons on trial in courts;
You convicts in prison-cells, you sentenced assassins, chaind and hand-cuffd with iron;
Who am I, too, that I am not on trial, or in prison?
Me, ruthless and devilish as any, that my wrists are not chaind with iron, or my ankles with iron?

You prostitutes flaunting over the trottoirs, or obscene in your rooms,
Who am I, that I should call you more obscene than myself?

O culpable!
I acknowledge, I exposé!
(O admirers! praise not me! compliment not me! you make me wince,
I see what you do not, I know what you do not.)

Inside these breast-bones I lie smutchd and choked;
Beneath this face that appears so impassive, hells tides continually run;
Lusts and wickedness are acceptable to me;
I walk with delinquents with passionate ...

Walt Whitman

Thought

Of persons arrived at high positions, ceremonies, wealth, scholarships, and the like;
To me, all that those persons have arrived at, sinks away from them, except as it results to their Bodies and Souls,
So that often to me they appear gaunt and naked;
And often, to me, each one mocks the others, and mocks himself or herself,
And of each one, the core of life, namely happiness, is full of the rotten excrement of maggots,
And often, to me, those men and women pass unwittingly the true realities of life, and go toward false realities,
And often, to me, they are alive after what custom has served them, but nothing more,
And often, to me, they are sad, hasty, unwaked sonnambules, walking the dusk.

Walt Whitman

A Hand-Mirror

Hold it up sternly! See this it sends back! (Who is it? Is it you?)
Outside fair costume--within ashes and filth,
No more a flashing eye--no more a sonorous voice or springy step;
Now some slave's eye, voice, hands, step,
A drunkard's breath, unwholesome eater's face, venerealee's flesh,
Lungs rotting away piecemeal, stomach sour and cankerous,
Joints rheumatic, bowels clogged with abomination,
Blood circulating dark and poisonous streams,
Words babble, hearing and touch callous,
No brain, no heart left--no magnetism of sex;
Such, from one look in this looking-glass ere you go hence,
Such a result so soon--and from such a beginning!

Walt Whitman

I Sit And Look Out

I sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all oppression and shame;
I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men, at anguish with themselves, remorseful after deeds done;
I see, in low life, the mother misused by her children, dying, neglected, gaunt, desperate;
I see the wife misused by her husband - I see the treacherous seducer of young women;
I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love, attempted to be hid - I see these sights on the earth;
I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny - I see martyrs and prisoners;
I observe a famine at sea - I observe the sailors casting lots who shall be kill'd, to preserve the lives of the rest;
I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon laborers, the poor, and upon Negroes, and the like;
All these ...

Walt Whitman

Faces

Sauntering the pavement, or riding the country by-road--lo! such faces!
Faces of friendship, precision, caution, suavity, ideality;
The spiritual, prescient face--the always welcome, common, benevolent face,
The face of the singing of music--the grand faces of natural lawyers and judges, broad at the back-top;
The faces of hunters and fishers, bulged at the brows--the shaved blanch'd faces of orthodox citizens;
The pure, extravagant, yearning, questioning artist's face;
The ugly face of some beautiful Soul, the handsome detested or despised face;
The sacred faces of infants, the illuminated face of the mother of many children;
The face of an amour, the face of veneration;
The face as of a dream, the face of an immobile rock;
The face withdrawn of its good and bad, a castrated face;
A ...

Walt Whitman

Thoughts

Of Public Opinion;
Of a calm and cool fiat, sooner or later, (How impassive! How certain and final!)
Of the President with pale face, asking secretly to himself, What will the people say at last?
Of the frivolous JudgeOf the corrupt Congressman, Governor, MayorOf such as these, standing helpless and exposed;
Of the mumbling and screaming priest(soon, soon deserted;)
Of the lessening, year by year, of venerableness, and of the dicta of officers, statutes, pulpits, schools;
Of the rising forever taller and stronger and broader, of the intuitions of men and women, and of self-esteem, and of personality;
Of the New WorldOf the Democracies, resplendent, en-masse;
Of the conformity of politics, armies, navies, to them and to me,
Of the shining sun by themOf the inherent light, greater than the r...

Walt Whitman