What a wonderful and pensive interlude!

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.

Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892)

A Prairie Sunset
by: Walt Whitman (1819-1892)




Shot gold, maroon and violet, dazzling silver, emerald, fawn,
The earth's whole amplitude and Nature's multiform power consign'd
for once to colors;
The light, the general air possess'd by them--colors till now unknown,
No limit, confine--not the Western sky alone--the high meridian--
North, South, all,
Pure luminous color fighting the silent shadows to the last.


 Walt Whitman

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




Walt Whitman, 
Song of the Open Road

“Not I - not anyone else, can travel that road for you, 


 You must travel it for yourself.”




Walt Whitman

“Keep your face always toward the sunshine 
and shadows will fall behind you.”






Walt Whitman

“And your very flesh shall be a great poem.”


Walt Whitman

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






Walt Whitman

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






Walt Whitman

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




Walt Whitman

"Wisdom is not finally tested in 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."

Walt Whitman

"You must not know too much or be too precise or scientific about birds and trees and flowers and watercraft; a certain free-margin, and even vagueness - ignorance, credulity - helps your enjoyment of these things."

Walt Whitman

In the broad earth of ours,
Amid the measureless grossness and the slag,
Enclosed and safe within its central heart,
Nestles the seed perfection. 



-Walt Whitman, Song of the Universal, Leaves of Grass, 1891

Song of the Open Road by Walt Whitman


1


AFOOT and light-hearted, I take to the open road, 


Healthy, free, the world before me, 


The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose.








Henceforth I ask not good-fortune—I myself am good 


fortune; 


Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need 


nothing, 5


Strong and content, I travel the open road.








The earth—that is sufficient; 


I do not want the constellations any nearer; 


I know they are very well where they are; 


I know they suffice for those who belong to them. 10


(Still here I carry my old delicious burdens; 


I carry them, men and women—I carry them with me 


wherever I go; 


I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them; 


I am filld with them, and I will fill them in return.)








2


You road I enter upon and look around! I believe you are 


not all that is here; 15


I believe that much unseen is also here.








Here the profound lesson of reception, neither preference 


or denial; 


The black with his woolly head, the felon, the diseasd, 


the illiterate person, are not denied; 


The birth, the hasting after the physician, the beggars 


tramp, the drunkards stagger, the laughing party of 


mechanics, 


The escaped youth, the rich persons carriage, the fop, 


the eloping couple, 20


The early market-man, the hearse, the moving of furniture 


into the town, the return back from the town, 


They pass—I also pass—anything passes—none can be 


interdicted; 


None but are accepted—none but are dear to me.








3


You air that serves me with breath to speak! 


You objects that call from diffusion my meanings, and 


give them shape! 25


You light that wraps me and all things in delicate equable 


showers! 


You paths worn in the irregular hollows by the 


roadsides! 


I think you are latent with unseen existences—you are so 


dear to me.








You flaggd walks of the cities! you strong curbs at the 


edges! 


You ferries! you planks and posts of wharves! you 


timber-lined sides! you distant ships! 30




You rows of houses! you window-piercd façades! you 


roofs! 


You porches and entrances! you copings and iron 


guards! 


You windows whose transparent shells might expose so 
much! 


You doors and ascending steps! you arches! 


You gray stones of interminable pavements! you trodden 


crossings! 35




From all that has been near you, I believe you have 


imparted to yourselves, and now would impart the same 


secretly to me; 


From the living and the dead I think you have peopled 


your impassive surfaces, and the spirits thereof would be 


evident and amicable with me.