Song of myself text. "Song of Myself" by Walt Whitman Flashcards 2022-11-06
Song of myself text
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"Song of Myself" is a poem by Walt Whitman, first published in 1855 as part of his collection Leaves of Grass. The poem is a celebration of the self, and it explores the theme of individuality and the connection between the individual and the world.
In the opening lines of the poem, Whitman introduces the theme of individuality and the idea that the self is infinite and unknowable. He writes, "I celebrate myself, and sing myself, / And what I assume you shall assume, / For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you." This passage suggests that the self is something that is constantly changing and evolving, and that it is not limited by the boundaries of the physical body.
Throughout the poem, Whitman uses a variety of techniques to convey the sense of unity and interconnectedness that he believes exists between all people. He frequently uses the pronoun "we" to refer to himself and the reader, and he speaks of the self as something that is shared by all people. He writes, "For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you." This passage suggests that the self is something that is shared by all people, and that we are all connected through our common humanity.
Whitman also uses imagery and metaphors to explore the theme of the self and its relationship to the world. For example, he writes, "I am the grass, / You are the leaves of me, and I am the leaves of you." This metaphor suggests that the self is not a fixed entity, but rather is constantly changing and evolving, just like the grass and the leaves of a tree.
In addition to exploring the theme of individuality and the connection between the self and the world, "Song of Myself" also celebrates the diversity and uniqueness of human experience. Whitman writes, "I celebrate the Me myself and I, / And what I assume you shall assume, / For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you." This passage suggests that the self is something that is constantly changing and evolving, and that it is not limited by the boundaries of the physical body.
Overall, "Song of Myself" is a powerful and thought-provoking poem that celebrates the self and the individual's place in the world. Through his use of imagery and metaphors, Whitman explores the theme of individuality and the connection between the self and the world, and he celebrates the diversity and uniqueness of human experience.
WALT WHITMAN poem SONG OF MYSELF English TEXT Poetry Whitman
O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues, And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing. I guess what you mean, I behold from the beach your crooked inviting fingers, I believe you refuse to go back without feeling of me; We must have a turn together. Something it swings on more than the earth I swing on, To it the creation is the friend whose embracing awakes me. The boy I love, the same becomes a man not through derived power, but in his own right, Wicked rather than virtuous out of conformity or fear, Fond of his sweetheart, relishing well his steak, Unrequited love or a slight cutting him worse than sharp steel cuts, First-rate to ride, to fight, to hit the bull's eye, to sail a skiff, to sing a song or play on the banjo, Preferring scars and the beard and faces pitted with small-pox over all latherers, And those well-tann'd to those that keep out of the sun. Have you heard that it was good to gain the day? The marriage estate and settlement. I do not press my fingers across my mouth, I keep as delicate around the bowels as around the head and heart, Copulation is no more rank to me than death is.
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Song of Myself Full Text
Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation. Earth of shine and dark mottling the tide of the river! I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun, I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags. I have said that the soul is not more than the body, And I have said that the body is not more than the soul, And nothing, not God, is greater to one than one's-self is, And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral, dressed in his shroud, And I or you pocketless of a dime may purchase the pick of the earth, And to glance with an eye or show a bean in its pod confounds the learning of all times, And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it may become a hero, And there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe, And any man or woman shall stand cool and supercilious before a million universes. Speaks beyond the boundarie, lays inside the interpretations, the code that rings through the trees carred by the wind. I myself become the wounded person, My hurt turns livid upon me as I lean on a cane and observe. Not a youngster is taken for larceny but I go up too, and am tried and sentenced.
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Song of Myself Poem Text
On women fit for conception I start bigger and nimbler babes. You will hardly know who I am or what I mean, But I shall be good health to you nevertheless, And filter and fibre your blood. For me the keepers of convicts shoulder their carbines and keep watch, It is I let out in the morning and barr'd at night. Each who passes is consider'd, each who stops is consider'd, not a single one can it fail. Retreating they had form'd in a hollow square with their baggage for breastworks, Nine hundred lives out of the surrounding enemy's, nine times their number, was the price they took in advance, Their colonel was wounded and their ammunition gone, They treated for an honorable capitulation, receiv'd writing and seal, gave up their arms and march'd back prisoners of war. I pass death with the dying, and birth with the new-washed babe.
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"Song of Myself" by Walt Whitman Flashcards
Sit a while dear son, Here are biscuits to eat and here is milk to drink, But as soon as you sleep and renew yourself in sweet clothes, I kiss you with a good-by kiss and open the gate for your egress hence. In the houses the dishes and fare and furniture — but the host and hostess, and the look out of their eyes? I am enamoured of growing outdoors, Of men that live among cattle or taste of the ocean or woods, Of the builders and steerers of ships, of the wielders of axes and mauls, of the drivers of horses, I can eat and sleep with them week in and week out. Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic, And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones, Growing among black folks as among white, Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I receive them the same. I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth, I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and fathomless as myself; They do not know how immortal, but I know. I too am not a bit tamed. Did you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars? Wherever he goes men and women accept and desire him, They desire he should like them, touch them, speak to them, stay with them. Broad muscular fields, branches of live oak, loving lounger in my winding paths, it shall be you! Have you practis'd so long to learn to read? Is he some southwesterner raised outdoors? Earth of the slumbering and liquid trees! My brain it shall be your occult convolutions! I am sorry for you, they are not murderous or jealous upon me, All has been gentle with me, I keep no account with lamentation, What have I to do with lamentation? If our colors are struck and the fighting done? I am he that walks with the tender and growing night, I call to the earth and sea half-held by the night.
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Song of Myself
However, as Whitman suggests, the universal human self that transcends the temporary individual self encompasses the diversity of humanity. Or I guess the grass is itself a child. This is the city and I am one of the citizens, Whatever interests the rest interests me, politics, wars, markets, newspapers, schools, The mayor and councils, banks, tariffs, steamships, factories, stocks, stores, real estate and personal estate. All truths wait in all things, They neither hasten their own delivery nor resist it, They do not need the obstetric forceps of the surgeon, The insignificant is as big to me as any, What is less or more than a touch? Further, everything that has ever existed in the past and in the future coalesces into the present moment so that everything the speaker experiences is divine—and exists in the afterlife, which, unlike the Christian belief in heaven, can be created and witnessed by people in the bodies they live in. Is he from the Mississippi country? I open my scuttle at night and see the far-sprinkled systems, And all I see, multiplied as high as I can cipher, edge but the rim of the farther systems. Page 32 My dinner, dress, associates, looks, compliments, dues, The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love, The sickness of one of my folks or of myself, or ill-doing or loss or lack of money, or depressions or exaltations, Battles, the horrors of fratricidal war, the fever of doubtful news, the fitful events; These come to me days and nights and go from me again, But they are not the Me myself.
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Song of Myself by Walt Whitman
Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation. I am the poet of the woman the same as the man, And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man, And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men. How is it I extract strength from the beef I eat? Part Fifty-Two I am born, I have lived, and now I have died - Be good to me, as I was and am good to you. They are alive and well somewhere, The smallest sprout shows there is really no death, And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it, And ceas'd the moment life appear'd. Did it make you ache so leaving me? In vain the speeding or shyness, In vain the plutonic rocks send their old heat against my approach, In vain the mastodon retreats beneath its own powder'd bones, In vain objects stand leagues off and assume manifold shapes, In vain the ocean settling in hollows and the great monsters lying low, In vain the buzzard houses herself with the sky, In vain the snake slides through the creepers and logs, In vain the elk takes to the inner passes of the woods, In vain the razor-bill'd auk sails far north to Labrador, I follow quickly, I ascend to the nest in the fissure of the cliff. A caesura is a break within a line of verse, often in the form of punctuation. Vapors lighting and shading my face it shall be you! The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the distillation, it is odorless, It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it, I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked, I am mad for it to be in contact with me.
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1881
Our frigate takes fire, The other asks if we demand quarter? I have lost my wits. I hear the violincello or man's heart's complaint, And hear the keyed cornet or else the echo of sunset. He speaks of them as if they are one in the same though they are different; they still are the same within themselves and as well within him. 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? The negro holds firmly the reins of his four horses, the block swags underneath on its tied-over chain, The negro that drives the long dray of the stone-yard, steady and tall he stands pois'd on one leg on the string-piece, His blue shirt exposes his ample neck and breast and loosens over his hip-band, His glance is calm and commanding, he tosses the slouch of his hat away from his forehead, The sun falls on his crispy hair and mustache, falls on the black of his polish'd and perfect limbs. Sermons, creeds, theology — but the fathomless human brain, And what is reason? I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars, And the pismire is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg of the wren, And the tree-toad is a chef-d'oeuvre for the highest, And the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven, And the narrowest hinge in my hand puts to scorn all machinery, And the cow crunching with depress'd head surpasses any statue, And a mouse is miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels.
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Song of Myself Study Guide
All I mark as my own you shall offset it with your own, Else it were time lost listening to me. I believe in those wing'd purposes, And acknowledge red, yellow, white, playing within me, And consider green and violet and the tufted crown intentional, And do not call the tortoise unworthy because she is not something else, And the jay in the woods never studied the gamut, yet trills pretty well to me, And the look of the bay mare shames silliness out of me. The sentries desert every other part of me, They have left me helpless to a red marauder, They all come to the headland to witness and assist against me. I troop forth replenish'd with supreme power, one of an average unending procession, Inland and sea-coast we go, and pass all boundary lines, Our swift ordinances on their way over the whole earth, The blossoms we wear in our hats the growth of thousands of years. Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue! This is the trill of a thousand clear cornets and scream of the octave flute and strike of triangles. The poet loves them all and is part of them all.
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Song of Myself (1892 version) by Walt Whitman
Everyone's life and the consequences of them and also of death. Down-hearted doubters, dull and excluded, Frivolous sullen moping angry affected disheartened atheistical, I know every one of you, and know the unspoken interrogatories, By experience I know them. Therefore, from the perspective of the universal self, which loves everyone equally, such battles promote the exact opposite of unity. Press close bare-bosom'd night — press close magnetic nourishing night! This day before dawn I ascended a hill and looked at the crowded heaven, And I said to my spirit, When we become the enfolders of those orbs and the pleasure and knowledge of every thing in them, shall we be filled and satisfied then? I merely stir, press, feel with my fingers, and am happy, To touch my person to some one else's is about as much as I can stand. One of that centripetal and centrifugal gang I turn and talk like a man leaving charges before a journey.
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Song of Myself Full Text and Analysis
Before I was born out of my mother generations guided me, My embryo has never been torpid, nothing could overlay it. 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? Alone far in the wilds and mountains I hunt, Wandering amazed at my own lightness and glee, In the late afternoon choosing a safe spot to pass the night, Kindling a fire and broiling the freshkilled game, Soundly falling asleep on the gathered leaves, my dog and gun by my side. Part Forty-Five he speaks of TIme and Space and how when he gets to the end of it he will be welcomed by God and he then will be complete - that all of Time will be complete. I ascend to the foretruck. Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you, You must travel it for yourself.
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