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Poems by Walt Whitman

by Walt Whitman

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1.

Think of the Soul;
I swear to you that body of yours gives proportions to your Soul somehow to
        live in other spheres;
I do not know how, but I know it is so.

2.

Think of loving and being loved; I swear to you, whoever you are, you can interfuse yourself with such things that everybody that sees you shall look longingly upon you.

3.

Think of the past; I warn you that, in a little while, others will find their past in you and your times.

The race is never separated—nor man nor woman escapes; All is inextricable—things, spirits, nature, nations, you too—from precedents you come.

Recall the ever-welcome defiers (the mothers precede them);
Recall the sages, poets, saviours, inventors, lawgivers, of the earth;
Recall Christ, brother of rejected persons—brother of slaves, felons,
        idiots, and of insane and diseased persons.

4.

Think of the time when you was not yet born;
Think of times you stood at the side of the dying;
Think of the time when your own body will be dying.

Think of spiritual results: Sure as the earth swims through the heavens, does every one of its objects pass into spiritual results.

Think of manhood, and you to be a man; Do you count manhood, and the sweet of manhood, nothing?

Think of womanhood, and you to be a woman;
        The creation is womanhood;
Have I not said that womanhood involves all?
Have I not told how the universe has nothing better than the best
        womanhood?

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