The Walt Whitman Archive
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About this Item
Title: Old Age's Lambent Peaks
Creator: Walt Whitman
Date: September 1888
Whitman Archive ID: per.00135
Source: Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine 38 (September 1888): 735. 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, and Susan Belasco
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OLD AGE'S LAMBENT PEAKS.1
THE touch of flame—the illuminating fire—the loftiest look at last,
O'er city, passion, sea—o'er prairie, mountain, wood—the earth itself;
The airy, different, changing hues of all, in falling twilight,
Objects and groups, bearings, faces, reminiscences;
The calmer sight—the golden setting, clear and broad:
So much i' the atmosphere, the points of view, the situations whence we scan,
Bro't out by them alone—so much (perhaps the best) unreck'd before;
The lights indeed from them—old age's lambent peaks.
Walt Whitman.