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Leaves of Grass (1871-72)
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ON THE BEACH AT NIGHT ALONE.
1 ON the beach at night alone, |
As the old mother sways her to and fro singing her
husky song,
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As I watch the bright stars shining—I think a thought
of the clef of the universes, and of the future.
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2 A VAST SIMILITUDE interlocks all, |
All spheres, grown, ungrown, small, large, suns, moons,
planets, comets, asteroids,
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All the substances of the same, and all that is spiritual
upon the same,
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All distances of place, however wide, |
All distances of time—all inanimate forms, |
All Souls—all living bodies, though they be ever so
different, or in different worlds,
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All gaseous, watery, vegetable, mineral processes—the
fishes, the brutes,
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All men and women—me also; |
All nations, colors, barbarisms, civilizations, languages; |
All identities that have existed, or may exist, on this
globe, or any globe;
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All lives and deaths—all of the past, present, future; |
This vast similitude spans them, and always has spann'd,
and shall forever span them, and compactly hold
them, and enclose them.
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