Walt Whitman Quotes

I sound my barbaric yawp over the rooftops of the world.

I may be as bad as the worst, but, thank God, I am as good as the best.

And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity.

Re-examine all that you have been told... dismiss that which insults your soul.

If you done it, it ain't bragging.

O captain! My Captain! Our fearful trip is done. The ship has weather'd every wrack 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 Heart! Heart! Heart! O the bleeding drops of red Where on the deck my captain lies Fallen cold and dead.

Are you the new person drawn toward me? To begin with, take warning - I am surely far different from what you suppose; Do you suppose you will find in me your ideal? Do you think it so easy to have me become your lover? Do you think the friendship of me would be unalloy'd satisfaction? Do you think I am trusty and faithful? Do you see no further than this façade—this smooth and tolerant manner of me? Do you suppose yourself advancing on real ground toward a real heroic man? Have you no thought, O dreamer, that it may be all maya, illusion?

I no doubt deserved my enemies, but I don't believe I deserved my friends.

Some people are so much sunshine to the square inch.

Either define the moment or the moment will define you.

When I give, I give myself.

Love the earth and sun and animals, Despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, Stand up for the stupid and crazy, Devote your income and labor to others... And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

In the faces of men and women, I see God.

I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars.

Now I see the secret of making the best person: it is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth.

I exist as I am, that is enough.

I celebrate myself, and sing myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

Every moment of light and dark is a miracle.

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

Simplicity is the glory of expression.

The real war will never get in the books.

The earth is rude, silent, incomprehensible at first; Be not discouraged - keep on - there are divine things, well envelop'd; I swear to you there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell.

A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.

I cannot be awake for nothing looks to me as it did before, Or else I am awake for the first time, and all before has been a mean sleep.

The future is no more uncertain than the present.

From this hour I ordain myself loos'd of limits and imaginary lines.

Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me? And why should I not speak to you?

To me, every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.

Let your soul stand cool and composed before a million universes.

The secret of it all, is to write in the gush, the throb, the flood, of the moment – to put things down without deliberation – without worrying about their style – without waiting for a fit time or place. I always worked that way. I took the first scrap of paper, the first doorstep, the first desk, and wrote – wrote, wrote…By writing at the instant the very heartbeat of life is caught.

The dirtiest book of all is the expurgated book.

If any thing is sacred, the human body is sacred.

Nothing can happen more beautiful than death.

Have you learned the lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you? Have you not learned great lessons from those who braced themselves against you, and disputed passage with you?

To have great poets, there must be great audiences.

Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity, When I give I give myself.

After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, conviviality, and so on - have found that none of these finally satisfy, or permanently wear - what remains? Nature remains.

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,

Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers where I can walk undisturbed.

To the real artist in humanity, what are called bad manners are often the most picturesque and significant of all.

I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles.

I am for those who believe in loose delights, I share the midnight orgies of young men, I dance with the dancers and drink with the drinkers.

Oh while I live, to be the ruler of life, not a slave, to meet life as a powerful conqueror, and nothing exterior to me will ever take command of me.

Sail Forth- Steer for the deep waters only. Reckless O soul, exploring. I with thee and thou with me. For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared go. And we will risk the ship, ourselves, and all.

Henceforth I ask not good fortune. I myself am good fortune.

The poet judges not as a judge judges but as the sun falling around a helpless thing.

Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.

The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.

There is that indescribable freshness and unconsciousness about an illiterate person that humbles and mocks the power of the noblest expressive genius.

Freedom - to walk free and own no superior.

In the confusion we stay with each other, happy to be together, speaking without uttering a single word.

Has anyone supposed it lucky to be born? I hasten to inform him or her that it is just as lucky to die, and I know it.

Nothing endures but personal qualities.

The shallow consider liberty a release from all law, from every constraint. The wise man sees in it, on the contrary, the potent Law of Laws.

I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.

I accept reality and dare not question it.

I heard what was said of the universe, heard it and heard it of several thousand years; it is middling well as far as it goes - but is that all?

I find no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.

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.

Wisdom is not finally tested by the schools, Wisdom cannot be pass'd from one having it to another not having it, Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof.

Other lands have their vitality in a few, a class, but we have it in the bulk of our people.

O lands! O all so dear to me - what you are, I become part of that, whatever it is.

Judging from the main portions of the history of the world, so far, justice is always in jeopardy.

There is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe.

To me, every hour of the light and dark is a miracle. Every cubic inch of space is a miracle.

Here or henceforward it is all the same to me, I accept Time absolutely.

There can be no theory of any account unless it corroborate with the theory of the earth.

Charity and personal force are the only investments worth anything.

Youth, large, lusty, loving — Youth, full of grace, force, fascination. Do you know that Old Age may come after you with equal grace, force, fascination?

I celebrate myself, and sing myself.

I say that democracy can never prove itself beyond cavil, until it founds and luxuriantly grows its own forms of art, poems, schools, theology, displacing all that exists, or that has been produced anywhere in the past, under opposite influences.

Many a good man I have seen go under.

All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor.

I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game. It will take our people out-of-doors, fill them with oxygen, give them a larger physical stoicism. Tend to relieve us from being a nervous, dyspeptic set. Repair these losses, and be a blessing to us.

Press close, bare-bosomed Night! Press close, magnetic, nourishing Night! Night of south winds! Night of the large, few stars! Still, nodding Night! Mad, naked, Summer Night!