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For more information or to volunteer visit LibriVox.org Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman Book 26 read by Hugh McGuire Passage to India One singing my days singing the great achievements of the present Singing the strong light works of engineers are modern wonders the antique ponderous seven outfied In the old world the east the Suez canal the new By its mighty railroad spanned the seas inlaid with elegant gentle wires Yet first to sound and ever sound the cry with the old soul The past the past the past the past The dark unfathom retrospect the teeming gulf the sleepers in the shadows The past the infinite greatness of the past for what is the present after all but the growth out of the past as A projectile formed impelled passing a certain line still keeps on so the present Utterly formed impelled by the past to Passage oh soul to India Eclersis the myths is the attic the primitive fables Not you alone proud truths of the world Nor you alone E facts of modern science, but myths and fables of Eld Asia's Africa's fables the far darting beams of the spirit the unloose dreams The deep diving Bibles and legends the daring plots of the poets the elder religions Oh you temples fairer than the lilies poured over by the rising Sun Oh you fables burning the known eluding the hold of the known Mounting to heaven You lofty and dazzling towers pinnacled red as roses burnished with gold Towers of fables immortal fashioned from mortal dreams You too I welcome and fully the same as the rest You too with joy icing Passage to India low soul cease thou not God's purpose from the first The earth to be spanned connected by network the races neighbors to marry and be given in marriage The oceans to be crossed the distance brought near the lands to be welded together a Worship knew I sing you captains voyagers explorers yours you engineers you architects machinist yours you Not for trade or transportation only but in God's name and for thy sake oh soul Three passage to India Low soul for thee of Tableau's twain. I See in one the Suez canal initiated opened I see the procession of steamships the Empress Eugenie's leading the van I Mark from on deck the strange landscape the pure sky the level sand in the distance I Pass swiftly the picturesque groups the workmen gathered the gigantic dredging machines In one again different yet thine all thine oh soul the same I See over my own continent the Pacific Railroads are mounting every barrier I See continual trains of cars winding along the plat Carrying freight and passengers. I hear the locomotives rushing and roaring in the shrill steam whistle. I Hear the echoes reverberate through the grandest scenery in the world I Cross the Laramie planes. I note the rocks and grotesque shapes the buttes. I See the plentiful Larkspur and wild onions the barren colorless sage deserts. I See in glimpses afar or towering immediately above me the great mountains. I see the wind river and the was such Mountains I see the monument mountain and the Eagles nest I Pass the promontory. I ascend the nevadas. I scan the noble elk mountain and wind around its base I see the Humboldt range. I thread the valley and cross the river. I see the clear waters of Lake Tahoe I see forests of majestic pines or crossing the great desert the alkaline plains I behold enchanting mirages of waters and meadows Marking through these and after all in duplicate slender lines bridging the three or four thousand miles of land travel Trying the eastern to the western sea the road between Europe and Asia Genoese thy dream thy dream centuries after thou art laid in thy grave the shore thou foundest verifies thy dream Four passage to India Struggles of many a captain tales of many a sailor dead Over my mood stealing and spreading they come Like clouds and cloudlets in the unreached sky Along all history down the slopes as a rivulet running Sinking now and now again to the surface rising a ceaseless thought a Varied train low soul to thee thy sight they rise the plans the voyages again the expeditions Again Vasco de gamma sales forth again the knowledge gained the mariners compass lands found a nation's born Thou born America For purpose vast men's long probation filled The rondure of the world at last accomplished five oh Vast rondure swimming in space covered all over with visible power and beauty alternate light and day the teeming spiritual darkness unspeakable high processions of sun and moon and countless stars above Below the manifold grass and waters animals mountains trees with inscrutable purpose Some hidden prophetic intention now first it seems my thought begins to span the Down from the gardens of Asia Descending radiating Adam and Eve appear Their myriad progeny after them wandering yearning curious with restless explorations With questionings baffled formless feverish with never happy hearts With that sad incessant refrain Wherefore unsatisfied soul and Wither oh mocking life who shall sue these feverish children Who justify these restless explorations Who speak the secret of impassive earth Who bind it to us? What is this separate nature so unnatural? What is this earth to our affections? Unloving earth without a throb to answer ours cold earth the place of graves Yet soul be sure the first intent remains and shall be carried out perhaps even now the time has arrived After the seas are all crossed as they seem already crossed After the great captains and engineers have accomplished their work After the noble inventors after the scientists the chemists the geologists ethnologists Finally shall come the poet worthy that name the true son of God shall come singing his songs Then not your deeds only oh voyagers. Oh scientists and inventors shall be justified All these hearts as a fretted children shall be soothed all affectations shall be fully responded to The secret shall be told all these separations and gaps shall be taken up and hooked and linked together The whole earth this cold impassive voiceless earth shall be completely justified Trinitas divine Shall be gloriously accomplished and compacted by the true son of God the poet He shall indeed pass the straits and conquer the mountains. He shall double the cape of good hope to some purpose Nature and man shall be disjoined and diffuse no more the true son of God shall absolutely fuse them Six yet at whose wide flung door I sing year of the purpose Accomplished year of the marriage of continents climates and oceans no mere dodge of Venice now wedding the Adriatic I See oh year in you the vast to rake we as globe given and giving all Europe to Asia Africa joined and they to the new world the lands geographies dancing before you holding a festival garland as Brides and bridegrooms hand-in-hand Passage to India cooling airs from caucuses far soothing cradle of man The river Euphrates flowing the past lit up again Low soul the retrospect brought forward the old most populous Wealthiest of earth's lands The streams of the Indus and the Ganges and their many affluence I my shores of America walking did today behold resuming all the tail of Alexander on his warlike marches suddenly dying on One side China and on the other side Persia and Arabia to the south the great seas and the Bay of Bengal The flowing literatures tremendous epics religions castes old occult Brahma interminably far back the tender and junior Buddha Central and southern empires and all their belongings possessors the wars of Tamerlane the reign of Agrabazi the traders rulers explorers Muslims Venetians Byzantium the Arabs Portuguese the first travelers famous yet Marco Polo but to the more Doubts to be solved the map in Cognita Blanks to be filled the foot of man unstayed the hands never rest Thy self-old soul that will not brook a challenge the medieval navigators rise before me the world of 1492 with its Awakened enterprise something swelling in humanity now like the sap of the earth in spring the sunset splendor of chivalry declining and Who are thou sad shade? Gigantic visionary thyself a visionary with majestic limbs and pious beaming eyes spreading around with every look of thine golden world and Hewing it with gorgeous Hughes as the chief historian down to the footlights walks in some great Sina Dominating the rest I see the admiral himself history's type of courage action faith Behold him sail from Palos leading his little fleet his voyage behold his return his great fame his misfortunes Caluminators behold him a prisoner chained behold his digestion poverty death curious in time I stand Noting the efforts of heroes is the deferment long Bitter the slander poverty death Lies the seed Unwrecked for centuries in the ground low to God's due occasion Uprising in the night its sprouts blooms and fills the earth with use and beauty seven Passage indeed oh soul to primal thought not lands and seas alone Thy own clear freshness the young maturity of brood and bloom two realms of budding Bibles Oh soul Repressless I with thee and thou with me thy circumnavigation of the world begin of man The voyage of his mind's return to reasons early paradise back Back to wisdom's birth to innocent intuitions again with fair creation Eight Oh, we can wait no longer We too take ship oh soul joyous we too launch out on trackless seas Fearless for unknown shores on waves of ecstasy to sail Amid the wafting winds thou pressing me to thee I thee to me Oh soul caroling free Singing our song of God chanting our chant of pleasant exploration We laugh and many a kiss Let others deprecate let others weep for sin remorse humiliation Oh soul thou pleasest me I thee Uh more than any priest oh soul We too believe in God But with the mystery of God we dare not dally Oh soul thou pleasest me I thee Sailing these seas or on the hills Or waking in the night thoughts silent thoughts of time and space and death like water is flowing Bear me indeed as though the region's infinite whose air I breathe whose ripples here Leave me all over bathe me oh God in the mounting to thee I in my soul to range in range of thee Oh thou transcendent Nameless the fiber in the breath Light of the light Shedding forth universes thou center of them thou mightier center of the true the good the loving Thou moral spiritual fountain Affection source thou reservoir O pensive soul of me O thirst unsatisfied weight is not there Weight is not happily for us somewhere there the comrade prefect Thou pulse thou motive of the stars sun systems That circling move in order safe harmonious I thwart the shapeless fastness of space how should I think how breathe a single breath how speak If out of myself I could not launch to those superior universes Swiftly I shrivel at the thought of God at nature and its wonders time and space and death But that I turning call to thee oh soul thou actual me and lo thou Gently masterous the orbs Thou matest time smilest content at death and fillest swellest Full the vastness of space greater than stars or suns Bounding oh soul thou journeyest forth what love than thine and ours could wider amplify What aspirations wishes out by thine and ours oh soul What dreams of the ideal what plans of purity perfection and strength What cheerful willingness for other's sake to give up all For other's sake to suffer all Reckoning ahead oh soul When thou the time achieved The seas all cross weathered the capes the voyage done surrounded copus Frontest God yieldest the aim attained As filled with friendship love complete the elder brother found the younger melts In fondness in his arms Nine Passage to more than india Are thy wings plumed indeed for such far flights oh soul voyages thou indeed on voyages like those Disportest thou on waters such as those soundest below the Sanskrit and the Vedas Then have thy bent unleashed passage to you your shores ye aged fierce enigmas Passage to you to master ship of you ye strangling problems You strewn with the wrecks of skeletons that living never reached you Passage to more than india a secret of the earth and sky of you oh waters of the sea Oh winding creeks and rivers of you oh woods and fields of you strong mountains of my land Of you oh prairies of you gray rocks oh morning red oh clouds oh rain and snows oh day And night passage to you Oh sun and moon and all you stars serious and jupiter passage to you Passage immediate passage the blood burns in my veins Away oh soul hoist instantly the anchor Cut the hozzers haul out shake out every sail have we not stood here like trees in the ground long enough Have we not groveled here long enough eating and drinking like mere brutes have we not Darkened and dazed ourselves with books long enough Sail forth steer for the deep waters only reckless oh soul exploring I with thee and thou with me For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go and we will risk the ship Ourselves and all oh brave soul Oh father father sail oh daring joy but safe Are they not all the seas of god? Oh father father father sail End of book 26 This is a liber box recording all liber box recordings are in the public domain For more information or to find out how you can volunteer, please visit liber box dot org Recorded by chip in Tampa, Florida on february 22nd 2006 Leaves of grass by walt whitman book 27 prayer of columbus A battered wrecked old man thrown on this savage shore far far from home Pent by the sea and dark rebellious brows 12 dreary months store Stiff with many toils Second and nigh to death I take my way along the island's edge venting a heavy heart I am too full of woe happily. I may not live another day I cannot rest oh god I cannot eat or drink or sleep till I put myself forth my prayer once more to thee Breathe bathe myself once more in the commune with thee Report myself once more to thee Thou knowest my years entire my life My long and crowded life of active worth not adoration merely Thou knowest the prayers and vigils of my youth Thou knowest my manhood solemn and visionary meditations Thou knowest how before I commenced I devoted all to come to thee Thou knowest I have in age ratified all those vows and strictly kept them Thou knowest I have not once lost nor faith nor ecstasy in thee In shackles prisoned in disgrace repining not Accepting all from thee as duly come from thee All my empresses have been filled with thee My speculations plans begun and carried on in thoughts of thee Sailing the deep or journeying the land for thee Intentions purports aspirations mine Leaving results to thee Oh, I am sure they really came from thee The urge, the ardour, the unconquerable will The potent felt interior command stronger than words A message from the heavens whispering to me even in sleep These sped me on By me and thee is the work so far accomplished By me earth's elder cloid and stifled lands uncloid, Unloosed, by me the hemispheres rounded and tied The unknown to the known The end I know not, it is all in thee Or small or great I know not Happily what broad fields, what lands Happily the brutish measureless human undergrowth I know Transplanted there may rise to stature Knowledge worthy thee Happily the swords I know may thee indeed be turned into reaping tools Happily the lifeless cross I know Europe's dead cross may bud and blossom here One effort more, my altar, this bleak sand That thou, O God, hast lighted with ray of light steady Ineffable, vouchsafed of thee Light rare, untellable, lighting the very light beyond all signs Descriptions, languages For that, O God, be it my latest word here on my knees Old, poor and paralyzed, I thank thee My terminus near, the clouds already closing upon me The voyage balked, the course disputed, lost I yield my ships to thee My hands, my limbs grow nervous My brain feels wracked, bewildered Let the old timbers part, I will not part I will cling fast to thee, O God, though the waves buffet me Thee, thee at last I know Is it the prophets thought I speak, or am I raving? What do I know of life? What of myself? I know not even my own work, past or present Dim, ever shifting guesses of its spread before me Of newer, better worlds, their mighty partuation Mocking, perplexing me And these things I see suddenly What mean they? As if some miracle, some hand divine Unsealed my eyes, shadowy, vast shapes Smile through the air and sky And on the distant waves sail countless ships And anthems in new tongues I hear Soluting me, so ends Book 27 Of Leaves of Grass Book 28 The Sleepers 1 I wander all night in my vision, Stepping with light feet swiftly and noiselessly Stepping and stopping, bending with open eyes Over the shut eyes of sleepers, wandering and confused Lost to myself, ill assorted contradictory Pausing, gazing, bending, and stopping How solemn they look there, stretched and still How quiet they breathe, the little children in their cradles The wretched features of ennuis The white features of corpses The livid faces of drunkards The sick gray faces of onanists The gashed bodies on battlefields The insane in their strong-doored rooms The sacred idiots, the newborn emerging from gates And the dying emerging from gates The night pervades them, and infolds them The married couple sleep calmly in their bed He with his palm on the hip of his wife She with her palm on the hip of the husband The sisters sleep lovingly, side by side In their bed, the men sleep lovingly, side by side In theirs, and the mother sleeps With her little child carefully wrapped The blind sleep and the deaf and dumb sleep The prisoner sleeps well in the prison The runaway son sleeps The murderer that is to be hung the next day How does he sleep, and the murdered person How does he sleep The female that loves unrequited sleeps And the male that loves unrequited sleeps The head of the money-maker that plotted all day sleeps And the enraged and treacherous dispositions all, all sleep I stand in the dark with drooping eyes By the worst suffering and the most restless I pass my hand soothingly to and fro a few inches from them The restless sink in their beds, they fitfully sleep Now I pierce the darkness, new beings appear The earth recedes from me into the night I saw that it was beautiful And I see that what is not the earth is beautiful I go from bedside to bedside I sleep close with the other sleepers each in turn I dream in my dream all the dreams of the other dreamers And I become the other dreamers I am a dance, play up there The fit is whirling me fast I am the ever-loughing It is new moon and twilight I see the hiding of docers I see nimble ghosts, whichever way look Cash and cash again Deep in the ground and sea and where is neither ground nor sea Well, do they do their jobs, those journeymen divine Only from me can they hide nothing And would not if they could I reckon I am their boss And they make me a pet besides And surround me and lead me And run ahead when I walk to lift their cunning covers To signify me with stretched arms and resume the way Onward we move a gay gang of blackards With mirth-shouting music and wild-flapping penance of joy I am the actor, the actress, the voter, the politician, the immigrant, and the exile The criminal that stood in the box He who has been famous and he who shall be famous after today The stammerer, the well-formed person, the wasted door, feeble person I am she who adorned herself and folded her hair expectantly My truant lover has come And it is dark Double yourself and receive me, darkness, receive me and my lover too He will not let me go without him I roll myself upon you as upon a bed I resign myself to the dusk He whom I call answers me and takes the place of my lover He rises with me silently from the bed Darkness, you are gentler than my lover His flesh was sweaty and panting I feel the hot moisture yet that he left me My hands are spread forth I pass them in all directions I would sound up the shadowy shore To which you are journeying too I descend my western course My sinews are flaccid Perfume and youth course through me and I am their wake It is my face yellow and wrinkled instead of the old woman's I sit low in a straw-bottom chair and carefully darn my grandson's stockings It is I too the sleepless widow looking out on the winter midnight I see the sparkles of starshine on the icy and pallid earth A shroud I see and I am the shroud I wrap a body and lie in the coffin it is dark here underground It is not evil or pain here It is blank here for reasons It seems to me that everything in the light and air ought to be happy Whoever is not in his coffin and the dark grave Let him know he has enough Three I see a beautiful gigantic swimmer swimming naked through the eddies of the sea His brown hair lies close and even to his head He strikes out with courageous arms and urges himself with his legs I see his white body I see his undaunted eyes I hate the swift running eddies that would dash him head-most on the rocks What are you doing you ruffianly red trickled waves? Will you kill the courageous giant? Will you kill him in the prime of his middle age? Steady and long he struggles He is baffled banged bruised he holds out while his strength holds out The slapping eddies are spotted with his blood they bear him away They roll him swing him turn him his beautiful body is born in the circling eddies It is continually bruised on the rocks Swiftly and out of sight is born the brave corpse Four I turn but do not extricate myself confused a past reading another but with darkness yet The beach is cut by the razory ice wind the wreck gun sound the tempest lulls the moon comes floundering through the drifts I look where the ship helplessly heads end on I hear the burst as she strikes I hear the howls of dismay They grow fainter and fainter I cannot aid with my ringing fingers I can but rush to the surf and let it drench me and freeze upon me I search with the crowd not one of the company is washed to us alive in the morning I help pick up the dead and lay them in rows in a barn five now of the older war days the defeat at brooklyn washington stands inside the line she stands on the entrenched hills amid a crowd of officers his face is cold and damp he cannot repress the weeping drops he lifts the glass perpetually to his eyes the color is blanched from his cheeks he sees the slaughter of the southern braves confided to him by their parents the same at last and at last when peace is declared he stands in the room of the old tavern the well-beloved soldiers all pass through the officers speechless and slow draw near in their turns the chief encircles their necks with his arm and kisses them on the cheek he kisses lightly the wet cheeks one after another he shakes hands and bids goodbye to the army six now what my mother told me one day as we sat at dinner together of when she was a nearly grown girl living home with her parents on the old homestead a red squaw came one breakfast time to the old homestead on her back she carried a bundle of rushes for rush-bottoming chairs her hair straight shiny coarse black profuse half enveloped her face her step was free and elastic and her voice sounded exquisitely as she spoke my mother looked in delight and amazement at the stranger she looked at the freshness of her tall-born face and full and pliant limbs the more she looked upon her she loved her never before had she seen such wonderful beauty and purity she made her sit on a bench by the jam of the fireplace she cooked food for her she had no work to give her but she gave her remembrance and fondness the red squaw stayed all the four noon and toward the middle of the afternoon she went away oh my mother was loath to have her go away all the week she thought of her she watched for her many a month she remembered her many a winter and many a summer but the red squaw never came nor was heard of there again seven a show of the summer softness a contact of something unseen and a more of the light and air i am jealous and overwhelmed with friendliness and i will go gallivant with the light and air myself oh love and summer you are in the dreams and in me autumn and winter are in the dreams the farmer goes with his thrift the droves and crops increase the barns are well filled elements merge in the night ships make tax in the dreams the sailor sails the exile returns home the fugitive returns unharmed the immigrant is back beyond months and years the poor irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood with the well-known neighbors and faces they warmly welcome him he is barefoot again but he forgets he is well off the dutchman voyages home and the scotchman and welchman voyage home and the native of the mediterranean voyages home to every port in england france spain enter well-filled ships the swiss foots it toward his hills the prussian goes his way the hungarian his way and the pole his way the swede returns and the danes and norwegian return the homeward bound and the outward bound the beautiful lost swimmer the ennui the onanist the female that loves unrequited the moneymaker the actor and actress those through with their parts and those waiting to commence the affectionate boy the husband and wife the voter the nominee that is chosen and the nominee that has failed the great already known and the great any time after today the stammerer the sick the perfect form the homely the criminal that stood in the box the judge that sat and sentenced him the fluent lawyers the jury the audience the lapper the weeper the dancer the midnight widow the red squaw the consumptive the iris pilot the idiot he that is wrong the antipodes and every one between this and them in the dark i swear they are averaged now no one is better than the other the night and sleep have likened them and restored them i swear they are all beautiful every one that sleeps is beautiful everything in the dim light is beautiful the wildest and bloodiest is over and all is peace peace is always beautiful the myth of heaven indicates peace and night the myth of heaven indicates the soul the soul is always beautiful it appears more or it appears less it comes or it lags behind it comes from the empowered garden and looks pleasantly on itself and encloses the world perfect and clean the genitals previously jetting and perfect and clean the womb cohering the head well grown proportioned and plum and the bowels and joints proportioned and plum the soul is always beautiful the universe is duly in order everything is in its place what has arrived is in its place and what waits shall be in its place the twisted skull waits the watery or rotten blood waits the child of the glutton or the venerale waits along and the child of the drunkard waits along and the drunkard himself waits along the sleepers that lived and died wait the far advanced are to go on in their turns and the far behind are to come on in their turns the diverse shall be no less diverse but they shall flow and unite they unite now eight the sleepers are very beautiful as they lie unclothed they flow hand in hand over the whole earth from east to west as they lie unclothed the asiatic and african are hand in hand the european and american are hand in hand learned and unlearned are hand in hand and male and female are hand in hand the bare arm of the girl crosses the bare breast of her lover they press close without lust his lips press her neck the father holds his grown or ungrown son in his arms with measureless love and the son holds the father in his arms with measureless love the white hair of the mother shines on the white wrist of the daughter the breath of the boy goes with the breath of the man the friend is in armed by friend the scholar kisses the teacher and the teacher kisses the scholar the wronged made right the call of the slave is one with the master's call and the master salutes the slave the felon steps forth from the prison the insane becomes sane the suffering of sick persons is relieved the sweatings and fevers stop the throat that was unsound is sound the lungs the consumptive are resumed the poor distressed head is free the joints of the rheumatic move as smoothly as ever and smoother than ever stiflings and passages open the paralyzed become supple the swelled and convulsed and congested awake to themselves in condition they pass the invigoration of the night and the chemistry of the night and awake i too pass from the night i stay a while oh night but i return to you again and love you why should i be afraid to trust myself to you i am not afraid i have been well brought forward by you i love the rich running day but i do not desert her in whom i lay so long i know not how i came of you and i know not where i go with you but i know i came well and shall go well i will stop only a time with the night and rise be times i will duly pass the day oh mother and duly return to you transpositions let the reformers descend from the stands where they are forever balling let an idiot or insane person appear on each of the stands let judges and criminals be transposed let prison keepers be put in prison let those that were prisoners take the keys let them that distrust birth and death lead the rest so ends book 28 of leaves of grass this is a leber vox recording all leber vox recordings are in the public domain for more information and to find out how you can volunteer please visit leber vox dot org recording dubbed by chip in tap of florida on january fifth 2006 leaves of grass by walt whitman chapter 29 to think of time to think of time all that retrospection to think of today and the ages continued hence forward have you guessed you yourself would not continue have you dreaded these earth beetles have you feared the future would be nothing to you is today nothing is the beginningless past nothing if the future is nothing they are surely just as nothing to think that the sun rose in the east that men and women were flexible real alive that everything was alive to think that you and I did not see feel think nor bear our part to think that we are now here and bear our part not a day passes not a minute or second without an accouchment not a day passes not a minute or second without a corpse the dull nights go over and the dull days also the soreness of lying so much in bed goes over the physician after long putting off gives the silent and terrible look for an answer the children come hurried and weeping and the brothers and sisters are sent for medicines stand unused on the shelf the camphor smell has long pervaded the rooms the faithful hand of the living does not desert the hand of the dying the twitching lips press lightly on the forehead of the dying the breath ceases and the pulse of the heart ceases the corpse stretches on the bed and the living look upon it it is palpable as the living are palpable the living look upon the corpse with their eyesight but without eyesight lingers a different living and looks curiously on the corpse to think the thought of death merged in the thought of materials to think of all these wonders of city and country and others taking great interest in them and we taking no interest in them to think how eager we are in building our houses to think others shall be just as eager and we quite indifferent I see one building the house that serves him a few years or 70 or 80 years at most I see one building the house that serves him longer than that slow moving and black lines creep over the whole earth they never cease they are the burial lines he that was president was buried and he that is now president shall surely be buried a reminiscent of the vulgar fate a frequent sample of the life and death of workmen each after his kind cold dash of waves at the ferry wharf posh and ice in the river half frozen mud in the streets a gray discouraged sky overhead the short last daylight of December a hearse and stages the funeral of an old Broadway stage driver the cortege mostly drivers steady the trot to the cemetery duly rattles the death bell the gate is passed the new dug grave is halted at the living a light the hearse uncloses the coffin is passed out lowered and settled the whip is laid on the coffin the earth is swiftly shoveled in the mound above is flattened with the spades silence a minute no one moves or speaks it is done he is decently put away is there anything more he was a good fellow free mouthed quick tempered not bad looking ready with life for death for a friend fond of women gambled eight hardy drank hardy had known what it was to be flush grew low spirited toward the last sickened and was helped by a contribution died aged 41 years and that was his funeral thumb extended finger uplifted apron cape gloves strap wet weather clothes whip carefully chosen boss spotter starter hustler somebody loafing on you you loafing on somebody headway man before and man behind good day's work bad day's work pet stock mean stock first out last out turning in at night to think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers and he there takes no interest in them the markets the government the working man's wages to think what to count they are through our days and nights to think that other working men will make just as great account of them yet we make little or no account the vulgar and the refined what you call sin and what you call goodness to think how wide a difference to think the difference will still continue to others yet we lie beyond the difference to think how much pleasure there is do you enjoy yourself in the city or engaged in business or planning a nomination and election or with your wife and family or with your mother and sisters or in womanly housework or the beautiful maternal cares these also flow onward to others you and I flow onward but in due time you and I shall take less interest in them your farm profits crops to think how engrossed you are to think that there will still be farms profits crops yet for you of what avail what will be will be well for what is well to take interest is well and to not take interest shall be well the domestic joys the daily housework or business the building of houses are not phantasms they have weight form location farms profits crops markets wages government are none of them phantasms the difference between sin and goodness is no delusion the earth is not an echo man and his life and all the things of his life are well considered you are not thrown to the winds you gather certainly and safely around yourself yourself yourself yourself forever and ever it is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and father it is to identify you it is not that you should be undecided but that you should be decided something long preparing and formless has arrived and formed in you you are henceforth secure whatever comes or goes the threads that were spun are gathered the weft crosses the warp the pattern is systematic the preparations have every one been justified the orchestra have sufficiently tuned their instruments the baton has given the signal the guest was coming he waited long he is now housed he is one of those who are beautiful and happy he is one of those that to look upon and be with is enough the law of the past cannot be eluded the law of the present and future cannot be eluded the law of the living cannot be eluded it is eternal the law of promotion and transformation cannot be eluded the law of heroes and good doers cannot be eluded the law of drunkards informers mean persons not one iota thereof can be eluded slow moving and black lines go ceaselessly over the earth northerner goes carried and the southerner goes carried and they on the atlantic side and they on the pacific and they between and all through the mississippi country and all over the earth the great masters and cosmos are well as they go the heroes and good doers are well the known leaders and inventors the rich owners and pious and distinguished may be well but there is more account than that there is strict account of all the interminable hordes of the ignorant and wicked are not nothing the barbarians of africa and asia are not nothing the perpetual successions of shallow people are not nothing as they go of and in all these things i have dreamed that we are not to be changed so much nor the law of us changed i have dreamed that heroes and good doers shall be under the present and past law and that murderers drunkards liars shall be under the present and past law for i have dreamed that the law they are under now is enough and i have dreamed that the purpose and essence of the known life the transient is to form and decide identity for the unknown life the permanent if all came but to ashes of dung if maggots and rats ended us then alarm for we are betrayed then indeed suspicion of death do you suspect death if i were to suspect death i should die now do you think i could walk pleasantly and well suited towards annihilation pleasantly and well suited i walk wither i walk i cannot define but i know it is good the whole universe indicates that it is good the past and present indicate that it is good how beautiful and perfect are the animals how perfect the earth and the minutest thing upon it what is called good is perfect and what is called bad is just as perfect the vegetables and minerals are all perfect and the imponderable fluids perfect slowly and surely they have passed on to this and slowly and surely they yet pass on i swear i think now that everything without exception has an internal soul the trees have rooted in the ground the weeds and the sea have the animals i swear i think there is nothing but immortality that the exquisite scheme is for it and the nebulous float is for it and the co-hearing is for it and all preparation is for it and identity is for it and life and materials are all together for it book 30 whispers of heavenly death darest thou now oh soul darest thou now oh soul walk out with me toward the unknown region where neither ground is for the feet nor any path to follow no map there nor guide nor voice sounding nor touch of human hands nor face with blooming flesh nor lips nor eyes are in that land i know it now oh soul nor does thou all is a blank before us all waits undreamed of in that region that inaccessible land till when the ties loosen all but the ties eternal time and space nor darkness gravitation sense nor any bounds bounding us then we burst forth we float in time and space oh soul prepared for them equal equipped at last oh joy oh fruit of all them to fulfill oh soul whispers of heavenly death whispers of heavenly death murmur die here labial gossip of night sibilant corals footsteps gently ascending mystical breezes wafted soft and low ripples of unseen rivers tides of a current flowing forever flowing or is it the plashing of tears the measureless waters of human tears i see just see skyward great cloud masses mournfully slowly they roll silently swelling and mixing with at times a half dimmed satin far off star appearing and disappearing some parturition rather some solemn immortal birth on the frontiers to eyes impenetrable some soul is passing over chanting the square deific chanting the square deific out of the one advancing out of the sides out of the old and new out of the square eternally divine solid four sided and all sides needed from this side jahovah am i old brahm i and i saturnious am not time affects me i am time old modern as any unpersuadable relentless executing righteous judgments as the earth the father the brown old chronos with laws aged beyond computation yet never knew ever with those mighty laws rolling relentless i forgive no man whoever sins dies i will have that man's life therefore let none expect mercy have the seasons gravitation the appointed days mercy no more have i but as the seasons and gravitation and as all the appointed days that forgive not i dispense from this side judgments inexorable without the least remorse consolator most mild the promised one advancing with gentle hand extended the might hear god am i foretold by prophets and poets in their most wrapped prophecies and poems from this side low the lord christ gazes low hermes i low mine is hercules face all sorrow labor suffering i tallying it absorb in myself many times have i been rejected taunted put in prison and crucified and many times shall be again all the world have i given up for my dear brothers and sisters sake for the soul's sake wandering my way through the homes of men rich or poor with the kiss of affection for i am affection i am the cheer bringing god with hope and all enclosing charity with indulgent words as two children with fresh and sane words mine only young and strong i pass knowing well i am destined myself to an early death but my charity has no death my wisdom dies not neither early nor late and my sweet love bequeathed here and elsewhere never dies aloof dissatisfying plotting revolt comrade of criminals brother of slaves crafty despise it to drudge ignorant with sudra face and worn brow black but in the depths of my heart proud as any lifted now and always against whoever scorning assumes to rule me morose full of guile full of reminiscences brooding with many while's though it was thought i was baffled and dispelled and my while's done but that will never be defiant i satan still live still utter words in new lands duly appearing and old ones also permanent here from my side warlike equal with any real as any nor time nor change shall ever change me or my words sun to spirit a breather life beyond the light lighter than light beyond the flames of hell joyous leaping easily above hell beyond paradise perfumed solely with my own perfume including all life on earth touching including god including saviour and satan ethereal pervading all form without me what were all what were god essence of forms life of the real identities permanent positive namely the unseen life of the great round world the sun and stars and the man i the general soul here the square finishing the solid i the most solid breathe my breath also through these songs of him i love day and night of him i love day and night i dreamed i heard he was dead and i dreamed i went where they had buried him i love but he was not in that place and i dreamed i wandered searching among burial places to find him and i found that every place was a burial place the houses full of life were equally full of dead this house is now the streets the shipping the places of amusement the chicago boston philadelphia the manhatta they were all full of the dead as of the living and fuller oh vastly fuller of the dead than of the living and what i dreamed i will henceforth tell to every person at age and i stand henceforth bound to what i dreamed and now i'm willing to disregard burial places and dispense with them and if the memorials of the dead were put up indifferently everywhere even in the room where i eat or sleep i should be satisfied and if the corpse of any one i love or if my own corpse be duly rendered to powder and poured in the sea i shall be satisfied or if it be distributed to the winds i shall be satisfied yet yet ye downcast hours yet yet ye downcast hours i know ye also weights of lead how ye clog and cling at my ankles earth to a chamber of mourning turns i hear the orweening mocking voice matter is conqueror matter triumphant only continues onward despairing cries float ceaselessly toward me the call of my nearest lover putting forth alarmed uncertain the sea i am quickly to sail come tell me come tell me where i am speeding tell me my destination i understand your anguish but i cannot help you i approach here behold the sad mouth the look out of the eyes your mute inquiry whether i go from the bed i recline on come tell me old age alarm done certain a young woman's voice appealing to me for comfort a young man's voice shall i not escape as if a phantom caressed me as if a phantom caressed me i thought i was not alone walking here by the shore but the one i thought was with me as now i walk by the shore the one i love that caress of me as i lean and look through the glimmering light that one has utterly disappeared and those who appear that are hateful and mock me assurances i need no assurances i am a man who is preoccupied of his own soul i do not doubt that from under the feet and beside the hands and face i am cognizant of are now faces i am not cognizant of calm and actual faces i do not doubt but the majesty and beauty of the world are latent in any iota of the world i do not doubt i am limitless and that the universes are limitless in vain i try to think how limitless i do not doubt that the orbs and the systems of orbs play their swift sports through the air on purpose and that i shall one day be eligible to do as much as they and more than they i do not doubt that temporary affairs keep on and millions of years i do not doubt interiors have their interiors and exteriors have their exteriors and that eyesight has another eyesight and that the hearing another hearing and the voice and other voice i do not doubt that the passionately wept deaths of young men are provided for and that the deaths of young women and the deaths of little children are provided for did you think life was so well provided for and death the purport of all life is not well provided for i do not doubt that rex had seen no matter what the horrors of them no matter whose wife child husband father lover has gone down are provided for to the minutest points i do not doubt that whatever can possibly happen anywhere at any time is provided for in the inheritances of things i do not think life provides for all and for time and space but i believe heavenly death provides for all quicksand years quicksand years that whirl me i know not wither your schemes politics fail lines give way substances mock and elude me only the theme i sing the great and strong possessive soul eludes not one self must never give way that is the final substance that out of all is sure out of politics triumphs battles life what at last finally remains when shows break up what but one self is sure that music always round me that music always round me unceasing unbeginning yet long untaught i did not hear but now the chorus i hear and am elated a tenor strong ascending with power and health with glad notes of daybreak i hear a soprano at intervals sailing buoyantly over the tops of immense waves a transparent base shuddering lusciously under and through the universe the triumphant tootie the funeral wailings of sweet flutes and violins and all these i fill myself with i hear not the volumes of sound merely i am moved by the exquisite meanings i listen to the different voices winding in and out striving contending with fiery vehemence to excel each other in emotion i do not think the performers know themselves but now i think begin to know them what ship puzzled at sea what ship puzzled at sea cons for the true reckoning or coming in to avoid the bars and follow the channel the perfect pilot needs here sailor here's ship take aboard the most perfect pilot whom in a little boat putting off and rowing i hailing you offer a noiseless patient spider a noiseless patient spider i marked where on the little promontory it stood isolated marked how to explore the vast vacant surrounding it launched forth filament filament filament out of itself ever unreeling them ever tirelessly speeding them and you oh my soul where you stand surrounded detached in measureless oceans of space ceaselessly musing venturing throwing seeking the spears to connect them to the bridge you will need be formed till the ductile anchor hold till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere oh my soul oh living always always dying oh living always always dying all the burials of me past and present oh me while i stride ahead visible material imperious as ever oh me what i was for years now dead i lament not i am content oh to disengage myself from those corpses of me which i turn and look back at where i cast them to pass on oh living always living and leave the corpses behind to one shortly to die from all the rest i single you out having a message for you you are to die let others tell you what they please i cannot pervericate i am exact and merciless but i love you there is no escape for you softly i lay my right hand upon you you must feel it i do not argue i bend my head close and half envelop it i sit quietly by i remain faithful i am more than nurse more than parent or neighbor i absolve you from all except yourself spiritual bodily that is eternal you yourself will surely escape the corpse you will leave will be but excrementious the sun bursts through in unlooked four directions strong thoughts fill you in confidence you smile you forget you are sick as i forget you are sick you do not see the medicines you do not mind the weeping friends i am with you i exclude others from you there's nothing to be commiserated i do not commiserate i congratulate you night on the prairies night on the prairies the supper is over the fire on the ground burns low the wearied emigrants sleep wrapped in their blankets i walk by myself i stand and look at the stars which i think now never realized before now i absorb immortality and peace i admire death and test propositions how planetus how spiritual how resume the same old man and soul the same old aspirations and the same content i was thinking the day most splendid till i saw what the night day exhibited i was thinking this globe enough till their sprang out so noiseless around me myriads of other globes now while the great thoughts of space and eternity fill me i will measure myself by them and now touched with the lives of other globes arrived as far along as those of the earth or in waiting to arrive or passed on farther than those of earth i hence forth no more ignore them than i ignore my own life or the lives of the earth arrived as far as mine or waiting to arrive i see now that life cannot exhibit all to me as the day cannot i see that i am to wait for what will be exhibited by death thought as i sit with others at a great feast suddenly while the music is playing to my mind when it comes i know not spectral in a mist of a wreck of sea of certain ships how they sail from port with flying streamers and wafted kisses and that is the last of them of the solemn and murky mystery about the fate of the president of the flower of the marine science of 50 generations pounded of the northeast coast and going down of the steamship arctic going down of the veiled tableau women gathered together on deck heroic pale waiting the moment that draws so close oh the moment a huge sob a few bubbles the white foam spurting up and then the women are gone sinking there while the passionless wet flows on and i now pondering are those women indeed gone our souls drowned and destroyed so is only matter triumphant the last invocation at the last tenderly from the walls of the powerful fortress house from the clasp of the knitted locks from the keep of the well closed doors let me be wafted let me glide noiselessly forth with the key of softness unlock the locks with the whispers set open the doors oh soul tenderly be not impatient strong is your hold oh mortal flesh strong is your hold oh love as i watched the plowman plowing as i watched the plowman plowing or the sower sowing the seeds or the harvester harvesting i saw there too oh life and death your analogies life life is the tillage and death is the harvest according pensive and faltering pensive and faltering the words the dead i write for the living are the dead happily the only living only real and i the apparition i the specter the end of book 30 this is a leber vox recording all leber vox recordings are in the public domain for more information and to find out how you can volunteer please visit leber vox.org recording done by chip in tabba florida on january fifth 2006 leaves of grass by walt whitman book 31 thou mother with thy equal brood thou mother with thy equal brood thou varied chain of different states yet one identity only a special song before i go i'd sing or all the rest for thee the future i'd sow a seed for thee of endless nationality i'd fashion thy ensemble including body and soul i'd show away ahead thy real union and how it may be accomplished the paths to the house i seek to make but leave to those to come the house itself belief i sing and preparation as life and nature are not great with reference to the present only but greater still from what is yet to come out of that formula for thee i sing as a strong bird on pinions free joyous the amplest spaces heavenward cleaving such be the thought i'd think of thee america such be the recitative i'd bring for thee the conceits of the poets of other lands i'd bring the knot nor the compliments that have served their turn so long nor rhyme nor the classics nor perfume of foreign court or indoor library but an odor i'd bring as from forests of pine in main or breath of an illinois prairie with open airs of virginia or georgia or tennessee or from texas uplands or florida's glades or the sarganes black stream or the wide blue spread of huron with presentment of yellowstone scenes or yosemite and murmuring under pervading all i'd bring the rustling sea sound that endlessly sounds from the two great seas of the world and for thy subtler sense subtler refrains dread mother preludes of intellect tallying these and the mind formulas fitted for the real and sane and large as these and the thou mounting higher driving deeper than we knew thou transcendental union by the fact to be justified blended with thought thought of man justified blended with god through thy idea lo the immortal reality through thy reality lo the immortal idea brain of the new world what a task is thine to formulate the modern out of the peerless grandeur of the modern out of thyself comprising science to recast poems churches art recast maybe discard them end them maybe their work is done who knows by vision hand conception on the background of the mighty past the dead to limb with absolute faith the mighty living present and yet thou living present brain air of the dead the old world brain thou that lay folded like an unborn babe within its folds so long thou carefully prepared by it for so long happily thou but unfolds it only maturest it it is to eventuate in thee the essence of the bygone time contained in the its poems churches arts unwitting to themselves destined with reference to thee thou but the apples long long long growing the fruit of all the old ripening today in thee sail sail thy best ship of democracy of value is thy freight tis not the present only the past is also stored in thee thou holds not the venture of thyself alone not of the western continent alone earth's resume entire floats on thy keel oh ship is steadied by thy spars with thee time voyages in trust the antecedent nations sink or swim with thee with all their ancient struggles martyrs heroes epics wars thou bears to the other continents theirs theirs as much as thine the destination port triumphant steer then with good strong hand and wary eye oh helmsman thou carriest great companions venerable priestly asia sails this day with thee and royal feudal europe sails with thee beautiful world of the new superber birth that rises to my eyes like a limitless golden cloud filling the western sky emblem of general maternity lifted above all sacred shape of the bearer of daughters and sons out of thy teeming womb thy giant babes in ceaseless procession issuing ascending from such generation taking and giving continual strength and life world of the real world of the twain in one world of the soul born by the world of the real alone led to identity body by it alone yet in the beginning only incalculable masses of composite precious materials by histories cycles forwarded by every nation language hithers sent ready collected here a freer vast electric world to be constructed here the true new world the world of orbex science morals literatures to come thou wonder world yet undefined unformed neither do i define thee how can i pierce the impenetrable blank of the future i feel thy ominous greatness evil as well as good i watch the advancing absorbing the present transcending the past i see thy light lighting and thy shadow shadowing as if the entire globe but i do not undertake to define thee hardly to comprehend thee i but the name the prophecy as now i merely the ejaculate thee in my future thee in thy only permanent life career thy own unloosened mind thy soaring spirit thee as another equally needed sun radiant ablaze swift moving fructifying all the risen impotent cheerfulness and joy in endless great hilarity scattering for good the cloud that hung so long and weighed so long upon the mind of man the doubt suspicion dread of gradual certain decadence of man the in thy larger saner brood of female male thee in thy athletes moral spiritual south north west east to thy immortal breasts mother of all thy every daughter son and dear it alike forever equal thee in thy own musicians singers artists unborn yet but certain thee in thy moral wealth and civilization until which thy proudest material civilization must remain in vain thee in thy all supplying all enclosing worship the in no single bible savior merely thy saviors countless latent within thyself by bibles incessant within thyself equal to any divine as any thy soaring course the formulating not only thy two great wars nor in thy centuries visible growth but far more in these leaves and chance thy chance great mother thee in an education grown of thee in teachers studies students born of thee thee in thy democratic feats en masse thy high original festivals operas lecturers preachers thee in thy ultimate the preparations only now completed the edifice on sure foundations tied thee in thy pinnacles intellect thought thy top most rational joys thy love and godlike aspiration in thy resplendent coming literati thy full longed orators thy sacri-dotal bards cosmic savans these these in thee certain to come today i prophesy land tolerating all accepting all not for the good alone all good for thee land in the realms of god to be a realm unto thyself under the rule of god to be a rule unto thyself low where arise these peerless stars to be thy natal stars my country ensemble evolution freedom set in the sky of law land of unprecedented faith god's faith thy soil by very subsoil all up heaved the general inner earth so long so seduously draped over now hence for what it is boldly laid bare opened by thee to heaven's light for benefit or bail not for success alone not to fair sail unintermitted always the storm shall dash live face the murk of war and worse than war shall cover thee all over worked capable of war its tug and trials be capable of peace its trials for the tug and moral strain of nations come at last in prosperous peace not war in many a smiling mask death shall approach beguiling thee thou in disease shall swelter the limit cancer spread its hideous claws clinging upon thy breasts seeking to strike thee deep within consumption of the worst moral consumption shall rouge lie faced with hectic but thou shalt face thy fortunes thy diseases and surmount them all whatever they are today whatever through time they may be they each and all shall lift and pass away and cease from thee while thou times spirals rounding out of thyself thyself still extricating fusing equitable natural mystical union thou the mortal with immortal blend shall soar toward the fulfillment of the future the spirit of the body and the mind the soul its destinies the soul its destinies the real real purport of all these apparitions of the real in thee america the soul its destinies thou globe of globes thou wonder nebulous but many a throw of heat and cold convulsed by these thyself solidifying thou mental moral orb thou new indeed new spiritual world the present holds thee not for such vast growth as thine for such unparalleled flight as thine such brood as thine the future only holds thee and can hold thee a pominoc picture two boats with nets lying off the sea beach quite still ten fishermen waiting they discover a thick school of moss bunkers they drop the join insane ends in the water the boats separate and row off each on its own rounding course to the beach and closing the moss bunkers the net is drawn in by a windless by those who stop ashore some of the fishermen lounge in their boats others stand ankle deep in the water poised on strong legs the boats partly drawn up the water slapping against them strewed on the sand in heaps and windrows well out from the water the green backed spotted moss bunkers