I always knew in my heart Walt Whitman's mind to be more like my own than any other man's living. As he is a very great scoundrel this is not a pleasant confession.
quote by Gerard Manley Hopkins
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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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
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And your very flesh shall be a great poem.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Produce great men, the rest follows.
quote by Walt Whitman
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A great city is that which has the greatest men and women.
quote by Walt Whitman
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To have great poets, there must be great audiences.
quote by Walt Whitman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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O Living Always--Always Dying
O LIVING always--always dying!
O the burials of me, past and present!
O me, while I stride ahead, material, visible, imperious as ever!
O me, what I was for years, now dead, (I lament not--I am content;)
O to disengage myself from those corpses of me, which I turn and look
at, where I cast them!
To pass on, (O living! always living!) and leave the corpses behind!
poem by Walt Whitman
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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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Pensive And Faltering
PENSIVE and faltering,
The words, the dead, I write;
For living are the Dead;
(Haply the only living, only real,
And I the apparition--I the spectre.)
poem by Walt Whitman
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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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To Old Age
I SEE in you the estuary that enlarges and spreads itself grandly as
it pours in the great Sea.
poem by Walt Whitman
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A Different Sky Is Waiting
We’ve been in the rain so long
That our eyes are sore and red;
When joy is missing,
We gaze down too long at our feet
As we slowly walk through the city,
But there must be a different sky waiting
Offering love and inspiration.
Beneath these yellow factory skies,
Even the street lights look sadly dim,
Like our spiritual light within
Blurred by an affectionless life.
Things began to change
When I met you in a small bar
Not far from the school where you teach;
I saw Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass
Easing out of your purse,
I knew we had to talk.
As we spoke over drinks
In the early evening,
I felt loneliness begin to lift
Like dark persistent clouds
Being pushed aside by sunlight,
As if Walt Whitman were sending us
Prayers mingled with lilacs.
Indeed, there is a different sky waiting,
Azure blue and dazzling,
Inviting flowers to bloom
On romantic avenues
When two people finally find each other.
In my mind I have already seen
You smile in a summer dress
Beneath a different sky welcoming our love.
poem by Uriah Hamilton
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But Walt and him shared the same kind of optimism. Walt believed in himself, and he was optimistic about what he wanted to do. He just knew it will be okay, and Dali was the same way. They had a great deal in common that way.
quote by John Hench
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O Bitter Sprig! Confession Sprig!
O BITTER sprig! Confession sprig!
In the bouquet I give you place also--I bind you in,
Proceeding no further till, humbled publicly,
I give fair warning, once for all.
I own that I have been sly, thievish, mean, a prevaricator, greedy,
derelict,
And I own that I remain so yet.
What foul thought but I think it--or have in me the stuff out of
which it is thought?
What in darkness in bed at night, alone or with a companion?
poem by Walt Whitman
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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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A Cloudy Imagination
The lingering cumulus clouds
imperceptibly changed their shapes
while I sat below discerning
these metamorphosed spectacles.
My imagination went wild
as they drifted across the sky.
It seemingly was like my mind
was orchestrating their transmuting.
I glanced at one that took the shape
of the poet Walt Whitman's head;
another like Sylvia Plath;
and yet another looked like Poe.
I glanced back at the Whitman cloud
but it changed into Erato.
I took my pad from my pocket
and began to write this poem.
poem by Albert Ahearn
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A child who does not think about what happens around him and is content with living without wondering whether he lives honestly is like a man who lives from a scoundrel's work and is on the road to being a scoundrel.
quote by Jose Marti
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I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.
quote by Walt Whitman
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I have learned that to be with those I like is enough.
quote by Walt Whitman
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If you done it, it ain't bragging.
quote by Walt Whitman
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