The Walt Whitman Archive
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About this Item
Title: My 71st Year
Creator: Walt Whitman
Date: November 1889
Whitman Archive ID: per.00006
Source: Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine 39 (November 1889): 31. 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, Heather Morton, Leslie Ianno, Ramon Guerra, and Susan Belasco
 image 1 |  cropped image 1 |
MY 71ST YEAR.1
AFTER surmounting threescore and ten,
With all their chances, changes, losses, sorrows,
My parents' deaths, the vagaries of my life, the many tearing passions of me, the war of '63
and '4,
and '4,
As some old broken soldier, after a long, hot, wearying march, or as haply after battle,
At twilight, hobbling, answering yet to company roll-call, Here, with vital voice,
Reporting yet, saluting yet the Officer over all.
Walt Whitman.