Quotes from Walt Whitman

The young are beautiful—but the old are more beautiful than the young.

I know perfectly well my own egotism, And know my omnivorous words, and cannot say any less, And would fetch you whoever you are flush with myself.

I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul, The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me, The first I graft and Increase upon myself, the latter I translate into new tongue.

To touch my person to some one else's is about as much as I can stand

I am he who walks the States with a barb'd tongue, questioning every one I meet, Who are you that wanted only to be told what you knew before? Who are you that wanted only a book to join you in your nonsense?

Why are there trees I never walk under but large and melodious thoughts descend upon me? (I think they hang there winter and summer on those trees and always drop fruit as I pass;)

The smallest sprout shows there is really no death.

I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.

is that the President? Then I will sleep awhile yet, for I see that these States sleep

I am he that walks with the tender and growing night, I call to the earth and sea half-held by the night.

What ever satisfies the soul is truth.

Shake out carols! Solitary here, the night's carols! Carols of lonesome love! death's carols! Carols under that lagging, yellow, waning moon! O under that moon where she droops almost down into the sea! O reckless despairing carols.

I hear the sound I love, the sound of the human voice, I hear all sounds running together, combined, fused, flowing, sounds of the city, sounds out of the city, sounds of the day and night.

Lo, the unbounded sea,   On its breast a ship starting, spreading all sails, carrying even       her moonsails.   The pennant is flying aloft as she speeds she speeds so stately—       below emulous waves press forward,   They surround the ship with shining curving motions and foam.         I

Come I should like to hear you tell me what there is in yourself that is not just as wonderful, And I should like to hear the name of anything between Sunday morning and Saturday night that is not just as wonderful.

O something pernicious and dread! Something far away from a puny and pious life! Something unproved! Something in a trance! Something escaped from the anchorage, and driving free.

However convenient this dwelling, we cannot remain here.

Crezco por igual en las regiones vastas y en las estrechas, crezco por igual entren los negros y los blancos.

Ah the dead to me mar not, they fit well in Nature, They fit very well in the landscape under the trees and grass, And along the edge of the sky in the horizon's far margin.

Remember, fear not, be candid, promulge the body and the soul, Dwell a while and pass on, be copious, temperate, chaste, magnetic, And what you effuse may then return as the seasons return, And may be just as much as the seasons.

Forth from the war emerging, a book I have made, The words of my book nothing, the drift of it every thing

All forces have been steadily employ'd to complete and delight me, Now on this spot I stand with my robust soul.

The wild gander leads his flock through the cool night, Ya-honk he says, and sounds it down to me like an invitation.

A great poem is no finish to a man or woman but rather a beginning.