While Behind All Firm and Erect
While behind all, firm and erect as ever,
Undismay’d amid the rapids—amid the irresistible and deadly urge,
Stands a helmsman, with brow elate and strong hand.
Leaves of Grass
Chapter List-
Leaves of Grass
-
Chapter_3
-
Leaves of Grass
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Inscriptions
-
One’s-Self I Sing
-
As I Ponder’d in Silence
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In Cabin’d Ships at Sea
-
To Foreign Lands
-
To a Historian
-
To Thee Old Cause
-
Eidólons
-
For Him I Sing
-
When I Read the Book
-
Beginning My Studies
-
Beginners
-
To the States
-
On Journeys Through the States
-
To a Certain Cantatrice
-
Me Imperturbe
-
Savantism
-
The Ship Starting
-
I Hear America Singing
-
What Place Is Besieged?
-
Still Though the One I Sing
-
Shut Not Your Doors
-
Poets to Come
-
To You
-
Thou Reader
-
Starting from Paumanok
-
1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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13
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14
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15
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16
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17
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18
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19
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Song of Myself
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1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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13
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14
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15
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16
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17
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18
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19
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20
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21
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22
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23
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24
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25
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26
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27
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28
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29
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30
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31
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32
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33
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34
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35
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36
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37
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38
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39
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40
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41
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42
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43
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44
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45
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46
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47
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48
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49
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50
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51
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52
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Children of Adam
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To the Garden the World
-
From Pent-Up Aching Rivers
-
I Sing the Body Electric
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1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
9
-
A Woman Waits for Me
-
Spontaneous Me
-
One Hour to Madness and Joy
-
Out of the Rolling Ocean the Crowd
-
Ages and Ages Returning at Intervals
-
We Two, How Long We Were Fool’d
-
O Hymen! O Hymenee!
-
I Am He That Aches with Love
-
Native Moments
-
Once I Pass’d Through a Populous City
-
I Heard You Solemn-Sweet Pipes of the Organ
-
Facing West from California’s Shores
-
As Adam Early in the Morning
-
Calamus
-
In Paths Untrodden
-
Scented Herbage of My Breast
-
Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in Hand
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For You O Democracy
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These I Singing in Spring
-
Not Heaving from My Ribb’d Breast Only
-
Of the Terrible Doubt of Appearances
-
The Base of All Metaphysics
-
Recorders Ages Hence
-
When I Heard at the Close of the Day
-
Are You the New Person Drawn Toward Me?
-
Roots and Leaves Themselves Alone
-
Not Heat Flames Up and Consumes
-
Trickle Drops
-
City of Orgies
-
Behold This Swarthy Face
-
I Saw in Louisiana a Live-Oak Growing
-
To a Stranger
-
This Moment Yearning and Thoughtful
-
I Hear It Was Charged Against Me
-
The Prairie-Grass Dividing
-
When I Peruse the Conquer’d Fame
-
We Two Boys Together Clinging
-
A Promise to California
-
Here the Frailest Leaves of Me
-
No Labor-Saving Machine
-
A Glimpse
-
A Leaf for Hand in Hand
-
Earth, My Likeness
-
I Dream’d in a Dream
-
What Think You I Take My Pen in Hand?
-
To the East and to the West
-
Sometimes with One I Love
-
To a Western Boy
-
Fast-Anchor’d Eternal O Love!
-
Among the Multitude
-
O You Whom I Often and Silently Come
-
That Shadow My Likeness
-
Full of Life Now
-
Salut au Monde!
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1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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13
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Song of the Open Road
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1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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13
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14
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15
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Crossing Brooklyn Ferry
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1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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Song of the Answerer
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1
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2
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Our Old Feuillage
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A Song of Joys
-
Song of the Broad-Axe
-
1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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Song of the Exposition
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1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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Song of the Redwood-Tree
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1
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2
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3
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A Song for Occupations
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1
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2
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3
-
4
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5
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6
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A Song of the Rolling Earth
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1
-
1
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2
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3
-
4
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Youth, Day, Old Age and Night
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Birds of Passage
-
Song of the Universal
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1
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2
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3
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4
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Pioneers! O Pioneers!
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To You
-
Chapter_263
-
Myself and Mine
-
Chapter_265
-
With Antecedents
-
1
-
2
-
3
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A Broadway Pageant
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1
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2
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3
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Sea-Drift
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Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking
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As I Ebb’d with the Ocean of Life
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1
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2
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3
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4
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Tears
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To the Man-of-War-Bird
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Aboard at a Ship’s Helm
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On the Beach at Night
-
The World Below the Brine
-
On the Beach at Night Alone
-
Song for All Seas, All Ships
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1
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2
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Patroling Barnegat
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After the Sea-Ship
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By the Roadside
-
Chapter_293
-
Chapter_294
-
A Hand-Mirror
-
Gods
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Germs
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Thoughts
-
When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer
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Perfections
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O Me! O Life!
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Chapter_302
-
To a President
-
I Sit and Look Out
-
To Rich Givers
-
The Dalliance of the Eagles
-
Chapter_307
-
A Farm Picture
-
A Child’s Amaze
-
The Runner
-
Beautiful Women
-
Mother and Babe
-
Thought
-
Visor’d
-
Thought
-
Gliding O’er All
-
Hast Never Come to Thee an Hour
-
Thought
-
To Old Age
-
Locations and Times
-
Offerings
-
Chapter_322
-
Drum-Taps
-
First O Songs for a Prelude
-
Eighteen Sixty-One
-
Beat! Beat! Drums!
-
From Paumanok Starting I Fly Like a Bird
-
Song of the Banner at Daybreak
-
Chapter_329
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Chapter_330
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Chapter_331
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Chapter_332
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Chapter_333
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Chapter_334
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Chapter_335
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Chapter_336
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Chapter_337
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Chapter_338
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Chapter_339
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Chapter_340
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Chapter_341
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Chapter_342
-
Rise O Days from Your Fathomless Deeps
-
1
-
2
-
3
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Virginia—The West
-
City of Ships
-
Chapter_349
-
Chapter_350
-
Chapter_351
-
Cavalry Crossing a Ford
-
Bivouac on a Mountain Side
-
An Army Corps on the March
-
By the Bivouac’s Fitful Flame
-
Come Up from the Fields Father
-
Vigil Strange I Kept on the Field One Night
-
A March in the Ranks Hard-Prest, and the Road Unknown
-
A Sight in Camp in the Daybreak Gray and Dim
-
As Toilsome I Wander’d Virginia’s Woods
-
Not the Pilot
-
Year That Trembled and Reel’d Beneath Me
-
The Wound-Dresser
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
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Long, Too Long America
-
Give Me the Splendid Silent Sun
-
1
-
2
-
Dirge for Two Veterans
-
Over the Carnage Rose Prophetic a Voice
-
I Saw Old General at Bay
-
The Artilleryman’s Vision
-
Ethiopia Saluting the Colors
-
Not Youth Pertains to Me
-
Race of Veterans
-
World Take Good Notice
-
O Tan-Faced Prairie-Boy
-
Look Down Fair Moon
-
Reconciliation
-
Chapter_383
-
As I Lay with My Head in Your Lap Camerado
-
Delicate Cluster
-
To a Certain Civilian
-
Lo, Victress on the Peaks
-
Chapter_388
-
Adieu to a Soldier
-
Turn O Libertad
-
To the Leaven’d Soil They Trod
-
Memories of President Lincoln
-
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d
-
1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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13
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14
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15
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16
-
O Captain! My Captain!
-
Chapter_411
-
This Dust Was Once the Man
-
By Blue Ontario’s Shore
-
1
-
1
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2
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3
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4
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5
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6
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7
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8
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9
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10
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11
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12
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13
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14
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15
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16
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17
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18
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19
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20
-
Reversals
-
Autumn Rivulets
-
As Consequent,etc.
-
The Return of the Heroes
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1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
There Was a Child Went Forth
-
Old Ireland
-
The City Dead-House
-
This Compost
-
1
-
2
-
To a Foil’d European Revolutionaire
-
Unnamed Lands
-
Song of Prudence
-
The Singer in the Prison
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
Warble for Lilac-Time
-
1
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
1
-
1
-
2
-
Vocalism
-
1
-
2
-
To Him That Was Crucified
-
You Felons on Trial in Courts
-
Laws for Creations
-
To a Common Prostitute
-
I Was Looking a Long While
-
Thought
-
Miracles
-
Sparkles from the Wheel
-
To a Pupil
-
Unfolded Out of the Folds
-
What Am I After All
-
Kosmos
-
Others May Praise What They Like
-
Who Learns My Lesson Complete?
-
Tests
-
The Torch
-
Chapter_487
-
The Ox-Tamer
-
Chapter_489
-
Wandering at Morn
-
Chapter_491
-
With All Thy Gifts
-
My Picture-Gallery
-
The Prairie States
-
Proud Music of the Storm
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
Passage to India
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
9
-
Prayer of Columbus
-
The Sleepers
-
1
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
Transpositions
-
To Think of Time
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
9
-
Whispers of Heavenly Death
-
Darest Thou Now O Soul
-
Whispers of Heavenly Death
-
Chanting the Square Deific
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
Of Him I Love Day and Night
-
Yet, Yet, Ye Downcast Hours
-
As if a Phantom Caress’d Me
-
Assurances
-
Quicksand Years
-
That Music Always Round Me
-
What Ship Puzzled at Sea
-
A Noiseless Patient Spider
-
O Living Always, Always Dying
-
To One Shortly to Die
-
Night on the Prairies
-
Thought
-
The Last Invocation
-
As I Watch’d the Ploughman Ploughing
-
Pensive and Faltering
-
Thou Mother with Thy Equal Brood
-
1
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
A Paumanok Picture
-
From Noon to Starry Night
-
Thou Orb Aloft Full-Dazzling
-
Faces
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
The Mystic Trumpeter
-
1
-
2
-
3
-
4
-
5
-
6
-
7
-
8
-
To a Locomotive in Winter
-
O Magnet-South
-
Mannahatta
-
All Is Truth
-
A Riddle Song
-
Excelsior
-
Ah Poverties, Wincings, and Sulky Retreats
-
Thoughts
-
Mediums
-
Weave In, My Hardy Life
-
Spain, 1873–74
-
By Broad Potomac’s Shore
-
Chapter_595
-
Old War-Dreams
-
Thick-Sprinkled Bunting
-
Chapter_598
-
Chapter_599
-
As I Walk These Broad Majestic Days
-
A Clear Midnight
-
Songs of Parting
-
As the Time Draws Nigh
-
Years of the Modern
-
Ashes of Soldiers
-
Thoughts
-
1
-
2
-
Song at Sunset
-
As at Thy Portals Also Death
-
My Legacy
-
Pensive on Her Dead Gazing
-
Camps of Green
-
Chapter_614
-
As They Draw to a Close
-
Joy, Shipmate, Joy!
-
The Untold Want
-
Portals
-
These Carols
-
Now Finalè to the Shore
-
So Long!
-
Mannahatta
-
Mannahatta
-
Paumanok
-
From Montauk Point
-
To Those Who’ve Fail’d
-
A Carol Closing Sixty-Nine
-
The Bravest Soldiers
-
A Font of Type
-
As I Sit Writing Here
-
My Canary Bird
-
Queries to My Seventieth Year
-
Chapter_633
-
The First Dandelion
-
America
-
Memories
-
To-day and Thee
-
After the Dazzle of Day
-
Chapter_639
-
Out of May’s Shows Selected
-
Halcyon Days
-
Fancies at Navesink
-
The Pilot in the Mist
-
Had I the Choice
-
You Tides with Ceaseless Swell
-
Last of Ebb, and Daylight Waning
-
And Yet Not You Alone
-
Proudly the Flood Comes In
-
By That Long Scan of Waves
-
Then Last of All
-
Election Day, November, 1884
-
With Husky-Haughty Lips, O Sea!
-
Death of General Grant
-
Chapter_654
-
Washington’s Monument, February, 1885
-
Chapter_656
-
Broadway
-
To Get the Final Lilt of Songs
-
Old Salt Kossabone
-
The Dead Tenor
-
Chapter_661
-
Chapter_662
-
Life
-
“Going Somewhere”
-
Chapter_665
-
True Conquerors
-
The United States to Old World Critics
-
The Calming Thought of All
-
Thanks in Old Age
-
Life and Death
-
The Voice of the Rain
-
Soon Shall the Winter’s Foil Be Here
-
Chapter_673
-
Chapter_674
-
Stronger Lessons
-
A Prairie Sunset
-
Twenty Years
-
Chapter_678
-
Twilight
-
You Lingering Sparse Leaves of Me
-
Not Meagre, Latent Boughs Alone
-
Chapter_682
-
Chapter_683
-
The Dismantled Ship
-
Now Precedent Songs, Farewell
-
An Evening Lull
-
Old Age’s Lambent Peaks
-
After the Supper and Talk
-
Sail Out for Good, Eidólon Yacht!
-
Chapter_690
-
Sail Out for Good, Eidólon Yacht!
-
Lingering Last Drops
-
Good-Bye My Fancy
-
On, on the Same, Ye Jocund Twain!
-
My 71st Year
-
Apparitions
-
The Pallid Wreath
-
An Ended Day
-
Old Age’s Ship & Crafty Death’s
-
To the Pending Year
-
Shakespeare-Bacon’s Cipher
-
Long, Long Hence
-
Bravo, Paris Exposition!
-
Chapter_704
-
To the Sun-Set Breeze
-
Old Chants
-
Chapter_707
-
Sounds of the Winter
-
A Twilight Song
-
When the Full-Grown Poet Came
-
Chapter_711
-
Chapter_712
-
A Persian Lesson
-
The Commonplace
-
Chapter_715
-
Chapter_716
-
L.ofG.’s Purport
-
The Unexpress’d
-
Grand Is the Seen
-
Unseen Buds
-
Goodbye My Fancy!
-
To Soar in Freedom and in Fullness of Power
-
To Soar in Freedom and in Fullness of Power
-
Then Shall Perceive
-
The Few Drops Known
-
One Thought Ever at the Fore
-
While Behind All Firm and Erect
-
Chapter_728
-
Chapter_729
-
Supplement Hours
-
Of Many a Smutch’d Deed Reminiscent
-
Chapter_732
-
Chapter_733
-
Chapter_734
-
A Thought of Columbus
-
A Backward Glance O’er Travel’d Roads
-
Endnotes