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Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman Quotes

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Famous Walt Whitman Quotes

“Lo, the most excellent sun so calm and haughty, The violet and purple morn with just-felt breezes, The gentle soft-born measureless light, The miracle spreading bathing all, the fulfill'd noon, The coming eve delicious, the welcome night and the stars, Over my cities shining all, enveloping man and land.”

MenLightNightStarsFeltBornCitiesSunLandMiracleShiningCalmWelcomeExcellentGentleDeliciousBreezeVioletPurpleNoonBathingHaughty
Book:Leaves of Grass: A Textual Variorum of the Printed Poems, 1860-1867
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“Sweet, sane, still Nakedness in Nature! — ah if poor, sick, prurient humanity in cities might really know you once more! Is not nakedness then indecent? No, not inherently. It is your thought, your sophistication, your fear, your respectability that is indecent. There come moods when these clothes of ours are not only too irksome to wear, but are themselves indecent. Perhaps indeed he or she to whom the free exhilarating ecstasy of nakedness in Nature has never been eligible (and how many thousands there are!) has not really known what purity is — nor what faith or art or health really is.”

IfsKnowsArtStillsBodyMightHumanityPoorCitiesKnownSweetClothesSickMoodPurityEcstasySaneExhilaratingSophisticationRespectabilityNudists
Book:Specimen Days & Collect
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“And as to you Death, and you bitter hug of mortality, it is idle to try to alarm me.... And as to you corpse, I think you are good manure, but that does not offend me, I smell the white roses sweet-scented and growing, I reach to the leafy lips — I reach to the polished breasts of melons. And as to you life, I reckon you are the leavings of many deaths, No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before.”

ThinkingTryingDoeDeathWhiteDoubtGrowingSweetThousandTenDiedRoseLeavingLipsSmellBitterNo DoubtBreastsGood ManMortalityHugIdleCorpsesAlarmsPolishedManureMelonsWhite Rose
Author:Walt Whitman
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“A murmuring, fateful, giant voice, out of the earth and sky, Voice of a mighty dying tree in the Redwood forest dense.... [T]he wood-spirits came from their haunts of a thousand years, to join the refrain; But in my soul I plainly heard. Murmuring out of its myriad leaves, Down from its lofty top, rising two hundred feet high, Out of its stalwart trunk and limbs - out of its foot-thick bark, That chant of the seasons and time - chant, not of the past only, but of the future.”

YearsTwoSoulEarthPastSpiritVoiceHeardTreeFeetSkyDyingThousandHundredSeasonsWoodsForestsMy SoulGiantsRisingThickThousand YearsLimbsLoftyRefrainBarkDenseTrunksMurmuringRedwoodsEarth And SkyStalwart
Author:Walt Whitman
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“Sex contains all, Bodies, Souls, meanings, proofs, purities, delicacies, results, promulgations, Songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk; All hopes, benefactions, bestowals, All the passions, loves, beauties, delights of the earth, All the governments, judges, gods, follow'd persons of the earth, These are contain'd in sex, as parts of itself, and justifications of itself.”

PersonsSoulBodyGovernmentEarthSongPassionSexLove IsResultsMysteryJudgingPrideDelightProofCommandPurityMilkJustificationDelicacyLove Passion
Book:Leaves of Grass
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“Sure as the most certain sure .... plumb in the uprights, well entreated, braced in the beams, Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical, I and this mystery we stand. Clear and sweet is my soul .... and clear and sweet is all that is not my soul, Lack one lacks both .... and the unseen is proved by the seen Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn. To elaborate is no avail .... Learned and unlearned feel that it is so.”

FeelsWellsSoulSpiritCertainReligionTurnsSpiritualityClearMysterySweetHorseProofMy SoulUnseenBeamElectricalAffectionateStoutHaughty
Author:Walt Whitman
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“With music strong I come, with my cornets and my drums, I play not marches for accepted victors only, I play marches for conquer'd and slain persons. Have you heard that it was good to gain the day? I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won. I beat and pound for the dead, I blow through my embouchures my loudest and gayest for them.”

PersonsPlaySpiritFallLostStrongHeardBattleBeatsGainsBlowAcceptedConquerPoundsMarch
Book:The Americanness of Walt Whitman
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“My rule has been, so far as I could have any rule (I could have no cast-iron rule) - my rule has been, to write what I have to say the best way I can - then lay it aside - taking it up again after some time and reading it afresh - the mind new to it. If there's no jar in the new reading, well and good - that's sufficient for me.”

IfsWayWritingMindWellsHas BeensI CanReadingLaysCastsBest WaySufficientIronJars
Book:Walt Whitman's Camden conversations
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