Walt Whitman Poems
A collection of select Walt Whitman famous poems that were written by Walt Whitman or written about the poet by other famous poets. PoetrySoup is a comprehensive educational resource of the greatest poems and poets on history.
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by
Walt Whitman
O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather'd every rack,
the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring; But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
SPIRIT that form’d this scene,
These tumbled rock-piles grim and red,
These reckless heaven-ambitious peaks,
These gorges, turbulent-clear streams, this naked freshness,
These formless wild arrays, for reasons of their own,
I know thee, savage spirit—we have communed together,
Mine too such wild arrays, for reasons of their own;
Was’t charged against my chants they had forgotten art?
To fuse...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
O BITTER sprig! Confession sprig!
In the bouquet I give you place also—I bind you in,
Proceeding no further till, humbled publicly,
I give fair warning, once for all.
I own that I have been sly, thievish, mean, a prevaricator, greedy, derelict,
And I own that I remain so yet.
What foul thought but I think it—or have in me...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
BY the City Dead-House, by the gate,
As idly sauntering, wending my way from the clangor,
I curious pause—for lo! an outcast form, a poor dead prostitute brought;
Her corpse they deposit unclaim’d—it lies on the damp brick pavement;
The divine woman, her body—I see the Body—I look on it alone,
That house once full of passion and beauty—all else...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
WHAT General has a good army in himself, has a good army;
He happy in himself, or she happy in herself, is happy,
But I tell you you cannot be happy by others, any more than you can beget or conceive a
child
by others....Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
UNFOLDED out of the folds of the woman, man comes unfolded, and is always to
come unfolded;
Unfolded only out of the superbest woman of the earth, is to come the superbest
man of the earth;
Unfolded out of the friendliest woman, is to come the friendliest man;
Unfolded only out of the perfect body of a woman, can...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
WANDERING at morn,
Emerging from the night, from gloomy thoughts—thee in my thoughts,
Yearning for thee, harmonious Union! thee, Singing Bird divine!
Thee, seated coil’d in evil times, my Country, with craft and black dismay—with
every
meanness, treason thrust upon thee;
—Wandering—this common marvel I beheld—the parent thrush I watch’d,
feeding
its young,
(The singing thrush, whose tones of joy...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
O BOY of the West!
To you many things to absorb, I teach, to help you become eleve of mine:
Yet if blood like mine circle not in your veins;
If you be not silently selected by lovers, and do not silently select lovers,
Of what use is it that you seek to become eleve of mine? 5...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
LOCATIONS and times—what is it in me that meets them all, whenever and wherever, and
makes
me at home?
Forms, colors, densities, odors—what is it in me that corresponds with them?...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
WHO is now reading this?
May-be one is now reading this who knows some wrong-doing of my past life,
Or may-be a stranger is reading this who has secretly loved me,
Or may-be one who meets all my grand assumptions and egotisms with derision,
Or may-be one who is puzzled at me.
As if I were not puzzled at myself!...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
HOLD it up sternly! See this it sends back! (Who is it? Is it you?)
Outside fair costume—within ashes and filth,
No more a flashing eye—no more a sonorous voice or springy step;
Now some slave’s eye, voice, hands, step,
A drunkard’s breath, unwholesome eater’s face, venerealee’s flesh,
Lungs rotting away piecemeal, stomach sour and cankerous,
Joints rheumatic, bowels clogged...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
MANHATTAN’S streets I saunter’d, pondering,
On time, space, reality—on such as these, and abreast with them, prudence.
2
After all, the last explanation remains to be made about prudence;
Little and large alike drop quietly aside from the prudence that suits immortality.
The Soul is of itself;
All verges to it—all has reference to what ensues;
All that a person does,...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
AS the time draws nigh, glooming, a cloud,
A dread beyond, of I know not what, darkens me.
I shall go forth,
I shall traverse The States awhile—but I cannot tell whither or how long;
Perhaps soon, some day or night while I am singing, my voice will suddenly cease.
2
O book, O chants! must all then amount to but...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
AS I ponder’d in silence,
Returning upon my poems, considering, lingering long,
A Phantom arose before me, with distrustful aspect,
Terrible in beauty, age, and power,
The genius of poets of old lands,
As to me directing like flame its eyes,
With finger pointing to many immortal songs,
And menacing voice, What singest thou? it said;
Know’st thou not, there...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
AFTER the Sea-Ship—after the whistling winds;
After the white-gray sails, taut to their spars and ropes,
Below, a myriad, myriad waves, hastening, lifting up their necks,
Tending in ceaseless flow toward the track of the ship:
Waves of the ocean, bubbling and gurgling, blithely prying,
Waves, undulating waves—liquid, uneven, emulous waves,
Toward that whirling current, laughing and buoyant, with curves,...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
A MARCH in the ranks hard-prest, and the road unknown;
A route through a heavy wood, with muffled steps in the darkness;
Our army foil’d with loss severe, and the sullen remnant retreating;
Till after midnight glimmer upon us, the lights of a dim-lighted building;
We come to an open space in the woods, and halt by the dim-lighted...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
FROM far Dakota’s cañons,
Lands of the wild ravine, the dusky Sioux, the lonesome stretch, the silence,
Haply to-day a mournful wail, haply a trumpet-note for heroes.
The battle-bulletin,
The Indian ambuscade, the craft, the fatal environment,
The cavalry companies fighting to the last in sternest heroism,
In the midst of their little circle, with their slaughter’d horses for breastworks,...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
OVER the carnage rose prophetic a voice,
Be not dishearten’d—Affection shall solve the problems of Freedom yet;
Those who love each other shall become invincible—they shall yet make Columbia
victorious.
Sons of the Mother of All! you shall yet be victorious!
You shall yet laugh to scorn the attacks of all the remainder of the earth.
No danger shall balk Columbia’s...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
BROTHER of all, with generous hand,
Of thee, pondering on thee, as o’er thy tomb, I and my Soul,
A thought to launch in memory of thee,
A burial verse for thee.
What may we chant, O thou within this tomb?
What tablets, pictures, hang for thee, O millionaire?
—The life thou lived’st we know not,
But that thou walk’dst...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
OUT from behind this bending, rough-cut Mask,
(All straighter, liker Masks rejected—this preferr’d,)
This common curtain of the face, contain’d in me for me, in you for you, in each for
each,
(Tragedies, sorrows, laughter, tears—O heaven!
The passionate, teeming plays this curtain hid!)
This glaze of God’s serenest, purest sky,
This film of Satan’s seething pit,
This heart’s geography’s map—this...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
OF these years I sing,
How they pass and have pass’d, through convuls’d pains as through parturitions;
How America illustrates birth, muscular youth, the promise, the sure fulfillment, the
Absolute
Success, despite of people—Illustrates evil as well as good;
How many hold despairingly yet to the models departed, caste, myths, obedience,
compulsion, and
to infidelity;
How few see the...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
GREAT are the myths—I too delight in them;
Great are Adam and Eve—I too look back and accept them;
Great the risen and fallen nations, and their poets, women, sages, inventors, rulers,
warriors,
and priests.
Great is Liberty! great is Equality! I am their follower;
Helmsmen of nations, choose your craft! where you sail, I sail,
I weather it out...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
WHAT ship, puzzled at sea, cons for the true reckoning?
Or, coming in, to avoid the bars, and follow the channel, a perfect pilot needs?
Here, sailor! Here, ship! take aboard the most perfect pilot,
Whom, in a little boat, putting off, and rowing, I, hailing you, offer....Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
CITY of ships!
(O the black ships! O the fierce ships!
O the beautiful, sharp-bow’d steam-ships and sail-ships!)
City of the world! (for all races are here;
All the lands of the earth make contributions here;)
City of the sea! city of hurried and glittering tides!
City whose gleeful tides continually rush or recede, whirling in and out, with eddies...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
OUT of the murk of heaviest clouds,
Out of the feudal wrecks, and heap’d-up skeletons of kings,
Out of that old entire European debris—the shatter’d mummeries,
Ruin’d cathedrals, crumble of palaces, tombs of priests,
Lo! Freedom’s features, fresh, undimm’d, look forth—the same immortal face
looks
forth;
(A glimpse as of thy mother’s face, Columbia,
A flash significant as of a...Read more of this...