If you’re looking for the best Leaves of Grass quotes you’ve come to the right place. We compiled a list of 39 quotes that best summarise the message of Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass. Let these quotes inspire you!
Leaves of Grass Quotes
Only themselves understand themselves and the like of themselves, As souls only understand souls.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.[From the preface to Leaves Grass]
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
My spirit has pass’d in compassion and determination around the whole earth.I have look’d for equals and lovers an found them ready for me in all lands, I think some divine rapport has equalized me with them
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
TO the States or any one of them, or any city of the States, Resist much, obey little, Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved, Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city of this earth, ever after-ward resumes its liberty.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I celebrate myself, and sing myself, And what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Come, said my SoulSuch verses for my Body let us write, (for we are one, )That should I after death invisibly return, Or, long, long hence, in other spheres, There to some group of mates the chants resuming, (Tallying Earth’s soil, trees, winds, tumultuous waves, )Ever with pleas’d smiles I may keep on, Ever and ever yet the verses owning — as, first, I here and now, Signing for Soul and Body, set to them my name
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Give me such shows–give me the streets of Manhattan!
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
O you youths, Western youths, So impatient, full of action, full of manly pride and friendship, Plain I see you Western youths, see you tramping with the foremost, Pioneers! O pioneers!
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Here is the test of wisdom, Wisdom is not finally tested in schools, Wisdom cannot be pass’d from one having it to another not having it, Wisdom is of the soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof, Applies to all stages and objects and qualities and is content, Is the certainty of the reality and immortality of things, and the excellence of things; Something there is in the float of the sight of things that provokes it out of the soul.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Not I, nor anyone else can travel that road for you.You must travel it by yourself.It is not far. It is within reach.Perhaps you have been on it since you were born, and did not know. Perhaps it is everywhere – on water and land.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
ThoughtOf equality- as if it harm’d me, giving others the same chancesand rights as myself- as if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Resist much, obey little.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
When I Read the Book”When I read the book, the biography famous, And is this then (said I) what the author calls a man’s life? And so will some one when I am dead and gone write my life? (As if any man really knew aught of my life, Why even I myself I often think know little or nothing of my real life, Only a few hints, a few diffused faint clews and indirections I seek for my own use to trace out here.)
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
WHAT am I, after all, but a child, pleas’d with the sound of my own name? repeating it over and over; I stand apart to hear—it never tires me. To you, your name also; Did you think there was nothing but two or three pronunciations in the sound of your name?
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
If you want me again look for me under your boot soles.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I am larger, better than I thought; I did not know I held so much goodness.All seems beautiful to me.Whoever denies me, it shall not trouble me; Whoever accepts me, he or she shall be blessed, and shall bless me.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I visit the orchards of God and look at the spheric productAnd look at quintillions ripened, and look at quintillions green.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Of Equality–as if it harm’d me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself–as if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I believe in the flesh and the appetites; Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle. Divine am I inside and out, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touch’d from;The scent of these arm-pits, aroma finer than prayer; This head more than churches, bibles, and all the creeds.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Great is language . . . . it is the mightiest of the sciences, It is the fulness and color and form and diversity of the earth . . . . and of men and women . . . . and of all qualities and processes;It is greater than wealth . . . . it is greater than buildings or ships or religions or paintings or music.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
The untold want, by life and land ne’er granted, Now, Voyager, sail thou forth, to seek and find.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Peace is always beautiful.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
O Me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring; Of the endless trains of the faithless—of cities fill’d with the foolish; Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?) Of eyes that vainly crave the light—of the objects mean—of the struggle ever renew’d; Of the poor results of all—of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me; Of the empty and useless years of the rest—with the rest me intertwined; The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life? Answer.That you are here—that life exists, and identity; That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
One’s-Self I Sing One’s-self I sing, a simple separate person, Yet utter the word Democratic, the word En-Masse. Of physiology from top to toe I sing, Not physiognomy alone nor brain alone is worthy for the Muse, I say the Form complete is worthier far, The Female equally with the Male I sing. Of Life immense in passion, pulse, and power, Cheerful, for freest action form’d under the laws divine, The Modern Man I sing.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Why should I be afraid to trust myself to you? I am not afraid, I have been well brought forward by you…
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
One world is aware and by far the largest to me, and that is myself, / And whether I come to my own to-day or in ten thousand or ten / million years, / I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I swear to you the architects shall appear without fall, I swear to you they will understand you and justify you, The greatest among them shall be he who best knows you, and encloses all and is faithful to all, He and the rest shall not forget you, they shall perceive that you are not an iota less than they, You shall be fully glorified in them.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
For we cannot tarry here, We must march my darlings, we must bear the brunt of danger, We, the youthful sinewy races, all the rest on us depend, Pioneers! O pioneers!
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
This is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless, Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done, Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou lovest best. Night, sleep, and the stars.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
not one escaped to tell the fall of Alamo, The hundred & fifty are dumb yet at Alamo.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
I think I will do nothing for a long time but listen, And accrue what I hear into myself…and let sound contribute toward me.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
The American bards shall be marked for generosity and affection and for encouraging competitors… . The great poets are also to be known by the absence in them of tricks and by the justification of perfect personal candor… . How beautiful is candor! All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Or may-be one who is puzzled at me.As if I were not puzzled at myself!
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Over the mountain growths, disease and sorrow, An uncaught bird is ever hovering, hovering, High in the purer, happier air.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Why should I wish to see God better than this day?I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then, In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass;I find letters from God dropped in the street, and every one is signed by God’s name, And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Press close, bare-bosomed Night! Press close, magnetic, nourishing Night!Night of south winds! Night of the large, few stars!Still, nodding Night! Mad, naked, Summer Night!from Strophe 21, “Song of Myself
— Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
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