"I believe in you my soul . . . . the other I am must not abase itself to you, And you must not be abased to the other. Loafe with me on the grass . . . . loose the stop from your throat, Not words, not music or rhyme I want . . . . not custom or lecture, not even the best, Only the lull I like, the "
"A child said, What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child? . . . . I do not know what it is any more than he. I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven. Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord, A scented gift and reme"
"Do you guess I have some intricate purpose? Well I have . . . . for the April rain has, and the mica on the side of a rock has. Do you take it I would astonish? Does the daylight astonish? or the early redstart twittering through the woods? Do I astonish more than they? This hour I tell things in co"
"I am the poet of the body, And I am the poet of the soul. The pleasures of heaven are with me, and the pains of hell are with me, The first I graft and increase upon myself . . . . the latter I translate into a new tongue. I am the poet of the woman the same as the man, And I say it is as great to b"
"I am he that walks with the tender and growing night; I call to the earth and sea half-held by the night. Press close barebosomed night! Press close magnetic nourishing night! Night of south winds! Night of the large few stars! Still nodding night! Mad naked summer night! Smile O voluptuous coolbrea"
"Through me many long dumb voices, Voices of the interminable generations of slaves, Voices of prostitutes and of deformed persons, Voices of the diseased and despairing, and of thieves and dwarfs, Voices of cycles of preparation and accretion, And of the threads that connect the stars—and of wombs, "
"To walk up my stoop is unaccountable . . . . I pause to consider if it really be, That I eat and drink is spectacle enough for the great authors and schools, A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books To behold the daybreak! The little light fades the immense and di"
"I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journeywork of the stars, And the pismire is equally perfect, and a grain of sand, and the egg of the wren, And the tree-toad is a chef-d’oeuvre for the highest, And the running blackberry would adorn the parlors of heaven, And the narrowest hinge in my "