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Broadway

About This Item

  • Title: Broadway
  • Date: 10 April 1888
  • Creator(s): Walt Whitman
  • Whitman Archive ID: per.00082
  • Source: New York Herald 10 April 1888: 6. 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. "Broadway." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 07 November 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
  • Source File: per.00082.xml (TEI)
per.00082.006per.00082.006_cropped

Broadway.1

[WRITTEN FOR THE HERALD.] What hurrying human tides, or day or night! What passions, winnings, losses, ardors, swim 
  thy waters! What whirls of evil, bliss and sorrow stem, thee! What curious questioning glances—glints of 
  love! Leer, envy, scorn, contempt, hope, aspiration! Thou portal—thou arena—thou of the myriad 
  long-drawn lines and groups! (Could but thy flagstones, curbs, facades tell 
  their inimitable tales); Thy windows, rich and huge hotels—thy side- 
  walks wide; Thou of the endless sliding, mincing, shuffling 
  feet! Thou, like the parti-colored world itself—like 
  infinite, teeming, mocking life! Thou visor'd, vast, unspeakable show and 
  lesson! WALT WHITMAN.

Notes

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

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