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Life

About This Item

  • Title: Life
  • Date: 15 April 1888
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: per.00083
  • Source: New York Herald 15 April 1888: 16. Our transcription is based on a digital image of a microfilm copy of an original issue. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the periodical poems, see our statement of editorial policy.
  • Contributors to digital file: Elizabeth Lorang April Lambert Susan Belasco
  • Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "Life." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 25 April 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: per.00083.xml (TEI)
per.00083.016per.00083.016_cropped

LIFE.1

Ever, the undiscouraged, resolute struggling 
  soul of man; Have former armies failed? Then we send fresh 
  armies—and fresh again2 Ever the grappled mystery of all earth's ages 
  old or new; Ever the eager eyes, hurrahs, the welcome-clap- 
  ping hands, the loud applause; Ever the soul dissatisfied, curious, unconvinced 
  at last; Struggling to-day the same—battling the same. WALT WHITMAN.

Notes

1. Reprinted in the "Sands at Seventy" annex to Leaves of Grass (1888). [back]

2. The "Sands at Seventy" version of the poem includes parentheses around the second line. [back]

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