The Walt Whitman Archive
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About this Item
Title: To the Year 1889
Creator: Walt Whitman
Date: January 5, 1889
Whitman Archive ID: per.00087
Source: Critic 14 (5 January 1889): 7. 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, and Susan Belasco
 image 1 |  cropped image 1 |
To the Year 18891
HAVE I no weapon-word for thee—some message brief and
fierce?
fierce?
Have I fought out and done indeed the battle? Is there no
shot left,
shot left,
For all thy affections, lisps, scorns, manifold silliness?
Nor for myself—my own rebellious self in thee?
Down, down, proud gorge!—though choking thee;
Thy bearded throat and high-borne forehead to the gutter;
Crouch low thy neck to eleemosynary gifts.
WALT WHITMAN.