Not for a moment, beautiful aged Walt Whitman, have I failed to see your beard full of butterflies.
quote by Federico Garcia Lorca
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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An Apple from Walt Whitman
There's never been a poet where I live,
but I grew up in the shade of Whitman's name:
born in West Hills—our hills—he would have walked
our paths along the crest. I walked Whitman Road,
crashed the Whitman Drive-In, stole a book
from the sci-fi rack at the Melville-Whitman Pharmacy,
even played lacrosse against Whitman High;
we lost three times, the guys from Halfway Hollow,
to young men with Whitman in white on their varsity jackets.
My mother tells a story about Thanksgiving,
back when kids went begging in rags and blackface:
how Carrie Wicks's sister said she got
an apple from Walt Whitman, right at his house,
an old man with a beard. The big kids laughed,
knowing the white-haired caretaker was no one.
I set no foot inside the Whitman House
or Leaves of Grass till after I went away,
but I'm better having grown up with the name,
the house and hills of a poet everyone knew,
a poet big enough in the mothers' stories
for a girl to believe he came to the door with a long
white beard and smiled and handed her an apple.
If a poet the size of Whitman named our few
square miles and a few in Jersey it's going to take
a lot more big ones to hand us all a welcome
sweet as a Thanksgiving apple from Walt Whitman,
white-haired care-taker, seed of mothers' stories,
Appleseed of our poetry: nourishment, shade.
poem by Eric Torgersen
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Nothing can happen more beautiful than death.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Every moment of light and dark is a miracle.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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And I will show that nothing can happen more beautiful than death.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The beautiful uncut hair of graves.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Supermarket in California
What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for I walked down the
streets under the trees with a headache self-conscious looking at the full moon.
In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon fruit
supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at night! Aisles
full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes! --- and you,
Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?
I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking among the
meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery boys.
I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the pork chops? What price
bananas? Are you my Angel?
I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans following you, and
followed in my imagination by the store detective.
We strode down the open corridors together in our solitary fancy tasting
artichokes, possessing every frozen delicacy, and never passing the cashier.
Where are we going, Walt Whitman? The doors close in an hour. Which way does
your beard point tonight?
(I touch your book and dream of our odyssey in the supermarket and feel
absurd.)
Will we walk all night through solitary streets? The trees add shade to
shade, lights out in the houses, we'll both be lonely.
Will we stroll dreaming of the lost America of love past blue automobiles in
driveways, home to our silent cottage?
Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher, what America did you
have when Charon quit poling his ferry and you got out on a smoking bank and
stood watching the boat disappear on the black waters of Lethe?
poem by Allen Ginsberg
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O Hymen! O Hymenee!
O HYMEN! O hymenee!
Why do you tantalize me thus?
O why sting me for a swift moment only?
Why can you not continue? O why do you now cease?
Is it because, if you continued beyond the swift moment, you would
soon certainly kill me?
poem by Walt Whitman
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Give me the splendid silent sun with all his beams full-dazzling.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers where I can walk undisturbed.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Butterflies For Breakfast? (Life Poem)
Butterflies before you sit the final exam,
Butterflies before you go for a job interview,
Butterflies before you ask her out on a date,
Butterflies before you kiss her for the first time,
Butterflies before you propose two will be one,
Butterflies before you meet her family,
Butterflies before you see her all in white,
Butterflies before you make that big speech,
Butterflies before you see that your baby is OK,
Butterflies before you get news from the doctor,
Butterflies before you lose your job again,
Butterflies before you face any little crisis,
But -
No butterflies for breakfast.
poem by Ian Beckett
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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?
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Come, Said My Soul
Come, said my soul,
Such verses for my body let us write, (For we are One),
That should I after death invisibly return,
Or, long, long hence, in other spheres,
There to some group of mates the chants resuming,
(Tallying Earth's soil, trees, winds, tumultous waves,)
Ever with pleas'd smile I may keep on
Ever and ever to the verses owning - as, first, I here and now,
Signing for soul and body, set them to my name,
Walt Whitman.
poem by Walt Whitman
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In America the young are always ready to give to those who are older than themselves the full benefits of their inexperience.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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So Far And So Far, And On Toward The End
SO far, and so far, and on toward the end,
Singing what is sung in this book, from the irresistible impulses of
me;
But whether I continue beyond this book, to maturity,
Whether I shall dart forth the true rays, the ones that wait unfired,
(Did you think the sun was shining its brightest?
No--it has not yet fully risen;)
Whether I shall complete what is here started,
Whether I shall attain my own height, to justify these, yet
unfinished,
Whether I shall make THE POEM OF THE NEW WORLD, transcending all
others--depends, rich persons, upon you,
Depends, whoever you are now filling the current Presidentiad, upon
you, 10
Upon you, Governor, Mayor, Congressman,
And you, contemporary America.
Whitman, Walt. 1900. Leaves of Grass.
poem by Walt Whitman
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To A Common Prostitute
To a Common Prostitute
BE composed--be at ease with me--I am Walt Whitman, liberal and lusty
as Nature;
Not till the sun excludes you, do I exclude you;
Not till the waters refuse to glisten for you, and the leaves to
rustle for you, do my words refuse to glisten and rustle for
you.
My girl, I appoint with you an appointment--and I charge you that you
make preparation to be worthy to meet me,
And I charge you that you be patient and perfect till I come.
Till then, I salute you with a significant look, that you do not
forget me.
poem by Walt Whitman
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There is a moment in time
There is a moment
where the interaction with the female form,
where the attraction of eyes, mouth, touch and skin
is drawing you in
and it’s as if you are living
in a time and place devoid
of any other thing
where religion, heaven and hell
is swept away by sheer bliss
where a moment is truly limitless
in the ebb and flow of mating
and the being together becomes everything.
[Reference: I sing the body electric by Walt Whitman.]
poem by Gert Strydom
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Beautiful Women
WOMEN sit, or move to and fro--some old, some young;
The young are beautiful--but the old are more beautiful than the
young.
poem by Walt Whitman
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Visor'd
A MASK--a perpetual natural disguiser of herself,
Concealing her face, concealing her form,
Changes and transformations every hour, every moment,
Falling upon her even when she sleeps.
poem by Walt Whitman
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Either define the moment or the moment will define you.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Sobbing Of The Bells
THE sobbing of the bells, the sudden death-news everywhere,
The slumberers rouse, the rapport of the People,
(Full well they know that message in the darkness,
Full well return, respond within their breasts, their brains, the sad
reverberations,)
The passionate toll and clang--city to city, joining, sounding,
passing,
Those heart-beats of a Nation in the night.
poem by Walt Whitman
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