Leaves of Grass (Barnes & Noble Classics Series)

Poem titles (in italics) and first lines of poems are listed together alphabetically, with reference to page numbers. In cases where first lines and titles are identical, only the title is listed. As in the text, titles from the First Edition are listed in brackets as their own entry.

A group of little children with their ways and chatter flow in

A line in long array where they wind betwixt green islands

A voice from Death, solemn and strange, in all his sweep and power

A woman waits for me, she contains all, nothing is lacking

All submit to them where they sit, inner, secure, unapproachable to analysis in the soul

All you are doing and saying is to America dangled mirages

As I sit in twilight late alone by the flickering oak-flame

As I sit with others at a great feast, suddenly while the music is playing

Be composed—be at ease with me—I am Walt Whitman, liberal and lusty as Nature

Brave, brave were the soldiers (high named to-day) who lived through the fight

By that long scan of waves, myself call’d back, resumed upon myself

Chanting the square deific, out of the One advancing, out of the sides

Come up from the fields father, here’s a letter from our Pete

Despairing cries float ceaselessly toward me, day and night

Did we count great, O soul, to penetrate the themes of mighty books

Down on the ancient wharf, the sand, I sit, with a newcomer chatting:

Ever the undiscouraged, resolute, struggling soul of man;

For the lands and for these passionate days and for myself

From all the rest I single out you, having a message for you

Full of wickedness, I—of many a smutch’d deed reminiscent—of worse deeds capable

Give me the splendid silent sun with all his beams full-dazzling

Grand is the seen, the light, to me-grand are the sky and stars

Have I no weapon-word for thee—some message brief and fierce?

Have you learn’d lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you‘

Here first the duties of to-day, the lessons of the concrete

Here the frailest leaves of me and yet my strongest lasting

Hold it up sternly—see this it sends back, (who is it? is it you?)

How they are provided for upon the earth, (appearing at intervals,)

I dream’d in a dream I saw a city invincible to the attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth

I have not so much emulated the birds that musically sing

I hear it was charged against me that I sought to destroy institutions

I heard that you ask’d for something to prove this puzzle the New World

I heard you solemn-sweet pipes of the organ as last Sunday morn I pass’d the church

I need no assurances, I am a man who is pre-occupied of his own soul

I say whatever tastes sweet to the most perfect person, that is finally right.

I see in you the estuary that enlarges and spreads itself grandly as it pours in the great sea.

I see the sleeping babe nestling the breast of its mother

I sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all oppression and shame

I was asking for something specific and perfect for my city

If I should need to name, O Western World, your powerfulest scene and show

In a far-away northern county in the placid pastoral region

In a little house keep I pictures suspended, it is not a fix’d house

In former songs Pride have I sung, and Love, and passionate, joyful Life

Lady, accept a birth-day thought—haply and idle gift and token

Let the reformers descend from the stands where they are forever bawling—let an idiot or insane person appear on each of the stands

Locations and times—what is it in me that meets them all, whenever and wherever, and makes me at home?

Long I thought that knowledge alone would suffice me—O if I could but obtain knowledge!

Many things to absorb I teach to help you become eleve of mine

More experiences and sights, stranger, than you’d think for;

Nations ten thousand years before these States, and many times ten thousand years before these States

Native moments—when you come upon me—ah you are here now

Not meagre, latent boughs alone, O songs! (scaly and bare, like eagles’ talons)

Not my enemies ever invade me—no harm to my pride from them I fear;

Not the pilot has charged himself to bring his ship into port, though beaten back and many times baffled

Not to exclude or demarcate, or pick out evils from their formidable masses (even to expose them,)

Now list to my morning’s romanza, I tell the signs of the Answerer

O you whom I often and silently come where you are that I may be with you

Of Equality—as if it harm’d me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself—as if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.

Of him I love day and night I dream‘d I heard he was dead

Of Justice—as if Justice could be any thing but the same ample law, expounded by natural judges and saviors

Of ownership—as if one fit to own things could not at pleasure enter upon all, and incorporate them into himself or herself;

Of ownership—As if one fit to own things could not at pleasure enter upon all, and incorporate them into himself or herself;

Of persons arrived at high positions, ceremonies, wealth, scholarships, and the like;

Of that blithe throat of thing from arctic bleak and blank

Of the visages of things—And of piercing through to the accepted hells beneath;

Of what I write from myself—As if that were not the resume;

Old farmers, travelers, workmen (no matter how crippled or bent,)

On my Northwest coast in the midst of the night a fishermen’s group stands watching

Once I pass’d through a populous city imprinting my brain for future use with its shows, architecture, customs, traditions

One hour to madness and joy! O furious! O confine me not!

Only themselves understand themselves and the like of themselves

Out of the rolling ocean the crowd came a drop gently to me

Passing stranger! you do not know how longingly I look upon you

Rise O Days from your fathomless deeps, till you loftier, fiercer sweep

Roaming in thought over the Universe, I saw the little that is Good steadily hastening towards immortality

Sauntering the pavement or riding the country byroads here then are faces

Sauntering the pavement or riding the country by-road, lo such faces!

Shot gold, maroon and violet, dazzling silver, emerald, fawn

Small the theme of my Chant, yet the greatest—namely, One‘s-Setf—a simple, separate person.

Sometimes with one I love I fill myself with rage for fear I effuse unreturn’d love

Steaming the northern rapids—(an old St. Lawrence reminiscence)

Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me? Stronger Lessons

Suddenly out of its stale and drowsy lair, the lair of slaves

Suddenly, out of its stale and drowsy lair, the lair of slaves

That music always round me, unceasing, unbeginning, yet long I untadid not hear

That shadow my likeness that goes to and fro seeking a livelihood, chattering, chaffering

The bodies of men and women engirth me, and I engirth them

The mystery of mysteries, the crude and hurried ceaseless flame, spontaneous, bearing on itself

The sobbing of the bells, the sudden death-news everywhere

The touch of flame—the illuminating fire—the loftiest look at last

There are who teach only the sweet lessons of peace and safety;

These carols sung to cheer my passage through the world I see

This is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless

This latent mine—these unlaunch’d voices—passionate powers

Thither as I look I see each result and glory retracing itself and nestling close, always obligated

Thou reader throbbest life and pride and love the same as

To the leaven’d soil they trod calling I sing for the last

To the States or any one of them, or any city of the States, Resist much, obey little

To the States, To Identify the 16th, 17th, or 18th Presidentiad

To-day, from each and all, a breath of prayer—a pulse of thought

Unfolded out of the folds of the woman man comes unfolded, and is always to come unfolded

Vocalism, measure, concentration, determination, and the divine power to speak words

Warble me now for joy of lilac-time, (returning in reminiscence,)

What am I after all but a child, pleas’d with the sound of my own name? repeating it over and over

What are those of the known but to ascend and enter the Unknown?

What General has a good army in himself, has a good army:

What place is besieged, and vainly tries to raise the siege?

When I heard at the close of the day how my name had been receiv’d with plaudits in the capitol, still it was not a happy night for me that follow‘d

When I peruse the conquer’d fame of heroes and the victories of mighty generals, I do not envy the generals

Where the city’s ceaseless crowd moves on the livelong day

While my wife at my side lies slumbering, and the wars are over long

Whoever you are, I fear you are walking the walks of dreams

Why reclining, interrogating? why myself and all drowsing?

You lingering sparse leaves of me on winter-nearing boughs

You tides with ceaseless swell! you power that does this work!

Youth, large, lusty, loving—youth full of grace, force, fascination

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