In Whitman's Hand

Manuscripts

About this Item

Title: I am that half grown

Creator: Walt Whitman

Date: Before 1855

Whitman Archive ID: duk.00027

Source: Trent Collection of Whitmaniana, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University. Transcribed from digital images of the original item. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of manuscripts, see our statement of editorial policy.

Editorial note: This manuscript was probably composed before 1855. The poem is not known to have been published in Whitman's lifetime. A transcription of the manuscript was first published in Notes and Fragments (1899), edited by Richard Maurice Bucke. The lines are a direct echo of another Whitman manuscript, a draft piece of short fiction: "Of a summer evening."

Related item: On the back of this manuscript is a prose draft about municipal legislation. See duk.00885.

Contributors to digital file: Zach Bajaber, Stacy Provan, Andrew Jewell, Kenneth M. Price, Kirsten Clawson, Janel Cayer, Nicole Gray, and Brett Barney



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[Page image: https://whitmanarchive.org/manuscripts/figures/duk_km.00011.jpg]

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I am that foolish half grown ^angry boy, fallen asleep,

The tears of foolish passion yet undried
upon my cheeks.


Years with all their events pass for me,

Some are spent in travel—some in the hun
usual hunt for after fortune.


I pass through ^the travels and fortunes ? of forty thirty
years, and become old,

Each in its due order comes and goes,

And then a message for me comes.

[end hashmark section]

The

Enteredyes


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[Page image: https://whitmanarchive.org/manuscripts/figures/duk_km.00010.jpg]




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