10. Starting from Paumanok

First published in 1800 under title of “Proto-Leaf.”

  1860. Proto-Leaf first stanza reads:

“FREE, fresh, savage,
Fluent, luxuriant, self-content, fond of persons and places,
Fond of fish-shape Paumanok, where I was born,
Fond of the sea—lusty-begotten and various,
Boy of the Mannahatta, the city of ships, my city,
Or raised inland, or of the south savannas,
Or full-breath’d on Californian air, or Texan or Cuban air,
Tallying, vocalizing all—resounding Niagara—resounding Missouri,
Or rude in my home in Kanuck woods,
Or wandering and hunting, my drink water, my diet meat,
Or withdrawn to muse and meditate in some deep recess,
Far from the clank of crowds, an interval passing, rapt and happy,
Stars, vapor, snow, the hills, rocks, the Fifth Month flowers, my amaze, my love,
Aware of the buffalo, the peace-herds, the bull, strong-breasted and hairy,
Aware of the mocking-bird of the wilds at daybreak,
Solitary, singing in the west, I strike up for a new world.”

  l. 4  1867 reads “city of ships my city—”

  l. 11  1867. For “earth” reads “earths.”

  l. 15  1860 adds “the Soul, your-self, the present and future lands.” 1867 adds “Yourself, the present and future lands.”

  l. 22  1860. “The globe” begins line 23.

  l. 37  1860. For “conquerors!” read “Masters!”

  l. 40  1860. For lines 40–44 reads:

“Chants of the prairies,
Chants of the long-running Mississippi,
Chants of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota,
Inland chants—chants of Kanzas,
Chants away down to Mexico, and up north to Oregon—Kanadian chants,
Chants of teeming and turbulent cities—chants of mechanics,
Yankee chants—Pennsylvanian chants—chants of Kentucky and Tennessee,
Chants of dim-lit mines—chants of mountain-tops,
Chants of sailors—chants of the Eastern Sea and the Western Sea,
Chants of the Mannahatta, the place of my dearest love, the place surrounded by hurried and sparkling currents,
Health chants—joy chants—robust chants of young men,
Chants inclusive—wide reverberating chants,
Chants of the Many In One.”

  l. 47  1860. “From” begins new line.

  l. 51  1860. After line 51 reads “With accumulations, now coming forward in front, arrived again, I harbor, for good or bad—I permit to speak.”

  l. 54  “take them, South, and take them, North!” added in 1867.

  l. 68  1860 reads “I own,” etc. (moving awhile among it;) added in 1867.

  l. 69  1860 reads “I think,” etc.

  l. 70  1860 reads “I regard it all intently a long while, Then take my place for good with my own day and race here.”

  l. 84  1860. After line 85 reads “And I will make a song of the organic bargains of These States—And a shrill song of curses on him who would dissever the Union.”

  l. 88  Lines 88–90 added in 1867.

  l. 94  1860 ’67. After line 94 read line 179 this edition.

  l. 105  1860 ’67. After “people” read “en-masse.”

  l. 105  “and my nation is” added in 1867.

  l. 110  1860. For “land” reads “earth.”

  l. 111  1860 ’67. For “I descend into the arena” read “I too go to the wars.”

  l. 112  1860 ’67. For “there” read “thereof.”

  l. 112  1860 reads “the conqueror’s shouts.”

  l. 113  “Who knows?” added in 1867.

  l. 119  1860. For “I say” reads “I specifically announce.”

  l. 121  Lines 121–2 added in 1867.

  l. 125  1860. For “politics” reads “materials.”

  l. 133  1860 reads “Mon cher!”

  l. 134  1860. For line 134 reads “Proceed, comrade.”

  l. 139  1860. Lines 138–139 read “O I see the following poems are indeed to drop in the earth the germ of a great religion.”

  l.   1860. Line 143 reads “Melange mine!” “Own,” etc., added in 1867.

  l. 145  1860. After line 145 reads “Wondrous interplay between the seen and unseen.”

  l. 146  1860. After line 146 reads “Extasy everywhere touching and thrilling me.”

  l. 149  1860 reads “Not he, adhesive, kissing me so long with his daily kiss.”

  l. 152  1860 reads “my unknown lovers,” “faithful and true,” added in 1867.

  l. 153  1860 reads “such themes.”

  l. 174  “Outlaw’d” added in 1867.

  l. 176  1860 reads “Namely to earn,” etc.

  l. 180  1860 reads “no imperfection in male or female, or in the earth, or in the present,” etc.

  l. 182  1860. For “that time,” etc., reads “that no one thing in the universe is inferior to another thing.”

  l. 191  1860. “afterward.”

  l. 204  1860. After line 204 reads “Toward the President, the Congress, the diverse Governors, the new Judiciary.”

  l. 206  1860 reads “O the lands!” next line, “Lands scorning invaders! Interlinked,” etc.

  l. 207  1860. After line 207, reads

“Odorous and sunny land! Floridian land!
Land of the spinal river, the Mississippi! Land of the Alleghanies! Ohio’s land!”

  l. 208  1860 reads “Land of the potato, the apple, and the grape!”

  l. 210  1860. After line 210 reads “Land there of rapt thought, and of the realization of the stars! Land of simple, holy, untamed lives!”

  l. 216  1860 reads “Land of many oceans.”

  l. 217  1860. For “ones” reads “lovers.”

  l. 222  1860. For lines 222–3 reads

“O all and each well-loved by me! my intrepid nations!
O I cannot be discharged from you!”

  l. 227  1860 For “in every town” reads “in many towns.”

  l. 232  1860. After “Arkansian” reads “the woman and the man of Utah, Dakotah, Nebraska, yet with me,” etc.

  l. 235  1860 reads “Yet a child of the North—yet Kanadian,” etc.

  l. 271  1860 reads “Old and new cities.”

  1860. After line 271 reads “See the populace, millions upon millions, handsome, tall, muscular, both sexes, clothed in easy and dignified clothes—teaching, commanding, marrying, generating, equally electing and elective.”

  l. 272  “stretching across,” etc., and line 273, added in 1867.

  l. 280  1860. After line 280 reads

“O power, liberty, eternity at last!
O to be relieved of distinctions! to make as much of vices as virtues!
O to level occupations and the sexes! O to bring all to common ground! O adhesiveness!
O the pensive aching to be together—you know not why, and I know not why.”

11. Ship Starting, The

First published in “Drum Taps,” 1865.

  l. 2  “starting” added in 1870.

12. Unfolded Out of the Folds

First published in 1856, under title of “Poem of Women.” In 1860 as No 14, “Leaves of Grass.”

13. To You

First published in 1860.

14. Walt Whitman

First published in 1855.

  l. 14  1855, “ripples and buzzed.”

  l. 38  “always sex” added in 1856.

  l. 52  1855 reads

“As God comes a loving bed-fellow and sleeps at my side all night and close on the peep of the day,
And leaves for me baskets covered with white towels bulging the house with their plenty.

  “with stealthy tread” added in 1867.

  l. 56  1855 ’56 read “to a cent.”

  l. 59  1855 ’56 read “of the ward” and “of the nation.”

  l. 61  1855, “looks, business,” etc. 1856, “looks, work,” etc.

  l. 64  Line 64 added in 1867.

  l. 65  1855 ’56. “They come,” etc.

  l. 69  “or” added in 1860.

  l. 70  1855 ’56 read “Looks with its side-curved head,” etc.

  l. 79  “once” added in 1860.

  l. 80  “How” added in 1860.

  l. 84  1855 reads “elderhand of my own.”

  l. 85  1855 reads “eldest brother.”

  l. 95  1855 ’56 ’60 read “dropped.”

  l. 132  1855. For “those” reads “all.”

  l. 137  1855 ’56 and ’60, before line 137, read “Who need be afraid of the merge?”

  l. 145  Line 145 in 1855 ’56 ’60 reads “It is so—I witnessed the corpse—there the pistol had fallen.”

  l. 146  1855 reads “and sluff.”

  l. 148  1855. “The carnival of sleighs, the clinking and shouted jokes and pelts of snow-balls.”

  l. 153  1855. After line 153 reads “The souls moving along, are they invisible while the least atom of the stones is visible?” 1856 and 1860, “while the least of the stones is visible.”

  l. 154  1855 reads “who fall on the flags,” etc.

  l. 158  1855 reads “I mind them or the resonance of them—I come again and again.” 1856 reads “I mind them or the resonance of them—I come and I depart.”

  l. 171  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Soundly falling asleep,” etc.

  l. 172  1855 ’56 ’60 ’67 read “her three sky-sails.”

  l. 174  1855 ’56 ’60 read “stopped.”

  l. 178  1855 reads “near by.”

  l. 179  1855 ’56 ’60 after “neck” begins new line: “One hand rested on his rifle—the other hand held firmly the wrist of the red girl.”

  l. 181  1855 ’56 ’60 read “stopped.”

  l. 215  1855 ’56 ’60 read “hammers roll.”

  l. 226  “and chain” added in 1867.

  l. 231  1855 reads “the red, yellow and white,” etc.

  l. 232  1855 reads “the green,” etc.

  l. 234  1855 ’56 ’60 read, “and the mocking-bird in the swamp never studied,” etc.

  l. 238  1855 reads “closer.”

  l. 239  1855 ’56 reads “November sky.”

  l. 248  1855 ’56 read “of the wielders,” etc., “of the drivers,” etc.

  l. 250  1855 reads “and cheapest and nearest and easiest.”

  l. 263  1855 ’56 read “The farmer stops by the bars of a Sunday, and looks,” etc.

  l. 267  1855 ’56 read “his eyes get blurred.”

  l. 268  1855 ’56 ’60 read “anatomist’s table.”

  l. 280  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 280 reads

“The reformer ascends the platform, he spouts with his mouth and nose,
The company returns from its excursion, the darkey brings up the rear and bears the well-riddled target.”

  l. 284  “while” added in 1860.

  l. 285  1855 ’56 “A week ago she bore,” etc.

  l. 292  “the race is begun” added in 1867.

  l. 301  1855 ’56 read “holds,” “he is surrounded,” etc.

  l. 302  1855 ’56 ’60 read “On the piazza walk five friendly matrons with twined arms.”

  l. 308  1855 ’56 read “July.”

  l. 313  1855 reads “go now through.”

  l. 327  “down by the Oconee I live” added in 1867.

  l. 329  “Louisianian or Georgian” added in 1867.

  l. 330  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 330 read “A Louisianian or Georgian, a Poke-easy from sand-hills and pines.” See line 329.

  l. 337  “yet” added in 1860.

  l. 338  1855 reads “Of every hue and trade and rank, of every caste and religion.” 1856 reads “Of every hue, trade, rank, of every caste and religion.” 1860 reads “Of every hue, trade, rank, caste and religion.”

  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 338 read “Not merely of the New World, but of Africa, Europe, Asia—a wandering savage.”

  l. 339  1855 reads “A farmer, mechanic, or artist—a gentleman, sailor, lover or quaker.” 1856 ’60 read “A farmer, mechanic, artist, gentleman, sailor, lover, quaker.”

  l. 340  1855 reads “or priest.”

  l. 342  1855 ’56 ’60 read “And breathe.”

  l. 348  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 348 read “If they do not enclose everything, they are next to nothing.”

  l. 352  After line 352, 1855 ’56 ’60 read

“This is the breath of laws and songs and behaviour,
This is the tasteless water of souls, this is the true sustenance,
It is for the illiterate, it is for the judges of the supreme court, it is for the federal capitol and the state capitols,
It is for the admirable communes of literary men [1856 ’60 read “literats.”] and composers and singers and lecturers and engineers and savans,
It is for the endless races of working people [1856 ’60 read “work-people.”] and farmers and seamen.
This is the trill of a thousand clear cornets and scream of the octave flute and strike of triangles.
I play not a march [1860 reads “not here marches.”] for victors only, I play great marches for conquered and slain persons.”

  1860 reads

“This is the breath for America, because it is my breath.
This is for laws, songs, behavior.”

  l. 357  1855 reads “I sound triumphal drums for the dead.” 1856 ’60 read “I beat,” etc.

  l. 358  1855 reads “I fling,” etc.

  l. 364  1855 ’56 ’60 ’67 read “pleasantly set.”

  1855 ’56 ’60 read “meat and drink.”

  l. 375  1855 ’56 read “for the April rain has.”

  l. 377  1855 reads “Or the early,” etc.

  l. 390  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I cock my hat,” etc.

  l. 391  1855 ’56 read “Shall I pray? Shall I venerate and be ceremonious?”

  l. 392  1855 reads

“I have pried through the strata and analyzed to a hair,
And counselled with doctors and [“and” omitted in 1856.] calculated close and found no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.”

  l. 399  1855 reads “And I know,” etc.

  l. 422  1855 reads “I chant a new chant,” etc.

  l. 441  1855 ’56 ’60 read, after line 441,

“Thruster holding me tight and that I hold tight!
We hurt each other as the bridegroom and the bride hurt each other.”

  l. 456  1855 ’56 ’60 read, after line 456, “I am the poet of common sense and of the demonstrable and of immortality.”

  l. 465  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I step up to say that what we do is right and what we affirm is right—and some is only the ore of right. Witness of us, one side a balance,” etc.

  l. 473  1855 ’56 ’60 read “a word.”

  l. 475  1855 ’56 ’60 read “One time as good as another, here or henceforward it is all the same to me.”

  l. 476  Lines 476–7 added in 1867.

  l. 478  1855 ’56 ’60 read “a word for reality, materialism first and last imbuing.”

  l. 482  1855 reads “lexicographer or chemist.”

  l. 485  1855 ’56 ’60 read

“Gentlemen! I receive you and attach and clasp hands with you,
The facts are useful and real—they are not my dwelling—I enter by them to an area of the dwelling.”

  l. 488  1855 ’56 ’60 read

“I am less the reminder of property or qualities, and more the reminder of life,
And go on the square for my own sake and for others’ sakes.”

  l. 492  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Walt Whitman, an American, one of the roughs, a Kosmos.” 1867 reads “Walt Whitman am I, of mighty Manhattan the son.”

  l. 493  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Disorderly.”

  l. 499  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 499 read “And whatever I do or say I also return.”

  l. 522  1855 reads “This head is more than churches or bibles or creeds.” 1866 reads “This head is more than churches, bibles, creeds.”

  l. 523  1855 ’56 ’60 read “If I worship any particular thing, it shall be some of the spread of my own body.”

  l. 525  “it shall be you” added in 1860.

  l. 542  Line 542 added in 1860, which reads, “O I am so wonderful.”

  l. 545  1855 ’56 read “To walk up my stoop is unaccountable,” etc.

  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 545 read “That I eat and drink is spectacle enough for the great authors and schools.”

  l. 560  “O” added in 1860.

  l. 565  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Walt, you understand enough,” etc.

  l. 567  “O speech” added in 1867.

  l. 573  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I refuse putting from me the best I am.”

  l. 575  1855 ’56 read “I crowd your noisiest talk by looking toward you.” 1860 reads “I crowd your sleekest talk,” etc.

  l. 578  “wholly” added in 1867. 1855 ’56 ’60 read “I confound the topmost skeptic.”

  l. 579  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I think I will do nothing for a long time but listen.”

  l. 580  1855 reads “and accrue” “and let sounds.”

  l. 582  1855 reads “I hear the sound of the human voice—a sound I love.”

  l. 583  1855 ’56 read “I hear all sounds as they are turned to their uses.”

  l. 585  1855 ’56 ’60 add “the recitative of fish-pedlars and fruit pedlars.”

  l. 591  “marching two and two” added in 1860.

  l. 593  1855 ’56 ’60 read “or man’s heart complaint.”

  l. 594  1855 reads”I hear the keyed cornet or else the echoes of sunset.” “It glides,” etc., and line 595 added in 1856.

  l. 596  1855 ’56 add “this indeed is music.”

  l. 600  1855 ’56 ’60 read “she convulses me like the climax of my love-grip.”

  l. 602  1855 reads

“It wrenches unnamable ardors from my breast;
It throbs me to gulps of the farthest down horror.”

  1856 ’60 ’67 read “The orchestra wrenches,” etc.

  l. 604  1855 ’56 ’60 read “poisoned hail.”

  “I lose my breath” added in 1867.

  l. 605  1855 ’56. For “throttled” read “squeezed.”

  l. 606  “At length” added in 1860.

  l. 609  Line 609 added in 1860.

  l. 682  1855 reads “live awhile with the animals.”

  l. 683  1855 ’56 read “I stand and look at them sometimes half the day long.” 1860 reads “I stand and look at them sometimes an hour at a stretch.”

  l. 692  1855 ’56 read “I do not know where they got those tokens.” 1860 reads “get those tokens.”

  l. 693  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I must have passed that way,” etc.

  l. 698  1855 reads “Picking out here one that shall be my amie, chosing to go with him on brotherly terms.” 1856 reads “Picking out here one that I love, chosing to go with on brotherly terms.” 1860 reads “Picking out here one that I love, chosing to go with on brotherly terms.”

  l. 702  1855 ’56 ’60 ’67 read “Eyes well apart, full,” etc.

  l. 703  “as” added in 1860.

  l. 704  1855 ’56 ’60 ’67 read “speed.”

  l. 706  1855 reads “And do not need your paces, and out-gallop them.”

  l. 707  1855 reads “And myself as I stand or sit pass faster than you.” 1856 reads “Myself as I stand or sit passing faster than you.”

  l. 708  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Swift wind! Space! My Soul! Now I know it is true what I guessed at.”

  l. 717  1855 reads “Hoeing my onion-patch, and rows of carrots,” etc.

  l. 723  “shaped” added in 1867.

  l. 724  “yellow-flowered” added in 1867.

  l. 732  1855 ’56 read “July eve.”

  l. 738  1855 ’56 ’60 ’67 read “out of its ribs.”

  l. 743  1855 ’56 read “Where the ground-shark’s fin cuts,” etc.

  l. 746  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Where the striped and starred flag,” etc.

  l. 752  1855 ’56 ’60 read “squash.”

  l. 762  1855 reads “by the slappy shore and laughs,” etc.

  l. 776  1855 reads “primitive tunes.”

  l. 777  1855 ’56 read “looking seriously.”

  l. 778  1855 ’56 read “pressing.”

  l. 781  1855 ’56 read “bearded.”

  l. 784  1855 ’56 ’60 read “By the coffin’d,” etc.

  l. 797  1855 reads “orchards of God, and look at the spheric product.”

  l. 802  1855 ’56 ’60 read “no law can prevent me.”

  l. 808  1855 ’56 read “We sail through,” etc.

  l. 811  1855 reads “mountains point up,” etc.

  l. 826  Line 826 added in 1860.

  l. 832  “olden” added in 1870.

  l. v  1855 reads “They taunt my dizzy ears, they beat, etc. .... with their whip-stocks.”

  l. 859  1855 reads “Again the reveille of drummers, again the attacking cannon and mortars and howitzers.” 1856 ’60 read “Again the reveille of drummers, again the attacking cannon, mortars, howitzers.”

  l. 861  1855 reads “Again the attacked send their cannon responsive.” 1856 ’60 omit “their.” 1870 reads “Again the cannon responsive.”

  l. 865  1855 reads “and to make.”

  l. 870  Line 870 added in 1867.

  l. 873  After line 873, 1855 ’56 read “Hear now the tale of a jet-black sunrise.”

  l. 874  1855 ’56 read “Hear now the murder in cold blood,” etc. 1860 reads “Hear now the tale of the murder in cold blood,” etc.

  l. 881  1855 ’56 read “Large, turbulent, brave, handsome, generous, proud and affectionate.” 1860 ’70 read “Large, turbulent, generous, brave, handsome, proud and affectionate.”

  l. 884  1855 ’56 read “Sunday.”

  l. 895  1855 ’56. After line 895 read “And that was a jet-black sunrise.”

  l. 896  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Did you read in the sea-books of an old-fashioned frigate-fight?”

  l. 897  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Did you learn,” etc.

  l. 898  Line 898 added in 1867.

  l. 899  “(said he;)” added in 1867.

  l. 906  Line 906 added in 1867.

  l. 907  “well up” added in 1867.

  l. 909  1855 ’56 ’60. For “is” read “was.”

  l. 910  1855 ’56 ’60. For “see” read “saw.”

  l. 911  1855 ’56 ’60. Read “was afire.”

  l. 912  1855 ’56 ’60. For “asks” read “asked.”

  l. 913  1855 ’56 ’60. Omit “is.”

  l. 914  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I laughed content when I heard the voice of my little captain,” and so, to line 942, the early editions read in the past tense. 1867 reads “Now I laugh,” etc., adding to end of line “(says my grandmother’s father.)”

  l. 918  1855 ’56 ’60 read “silenced.”

  1855 ’56 ’60 read “cleared.”

  l. 927  1867 reads, after line 927, “O now it is not my grandmother’s father there in the fight; I feel it is I myself.”

  l. 943  1855 ’56. For lines 943–4 read

“O Christ! my fit is mastering me!
What the rebel said gaily adjusting his throat to the rope-noose,
What the savage at the stump, his eye-sockets empty, his mouth spirting whoops and defiance,
What stills the traveler come to the vault at Mount Vernon.
What sobers the Brooklyn boy as he looks down on the shores of the Wallabout and remembers the prison ships,
What burst the guns of the redcoat at Saratoga when he surrendered his brigades,
These become mine and me every one, and they are but little.
I become as much more as I like.”

  1860 reads

“O Christ! This is mastering me!
Through the conquered doors they crowd. I am possessed.”

  Then follows as in 1855 ’56.

  l. 944  1867 reads “Through the conquered,” etc.

  l. 945  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I become any presence or truth of humanity here.”

  l. 956  1855 ’56. After line 956 read

“I rise extatic through all and sweep with the true gravitation,
The whirling and whirling is elemental within me.”

  1860 reads

“Enough—I bring such to a close,
Rise extatic through all,” etc., as in 1855 ’56.

  l. 957  Line 957 added in 1867.

  l. 967  1855 ’56 read “roll away.”

  l. 968  1855. After line 968 reads “We walk the roads of Ohio and Massachusetts and Virginia and Wisconsin and New York and New Orleans and Texas and Montreal and San Francisco and Charleston and Savannah and Mexico.” 1856 ’60 same as above, with changes in arrangement.

  l. 969  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Inland and by the sea-coast and boundary lines,” etc.

  l. 971  1855 ’56 ’60 read “growth of two thousand years.”

  l. 972  1855 ’56 ’60 read

“Elves, I salute you,
I see the approach of your numberless gangs, I see you understand yourselves and me,
And know that they who have eyes are divine, and the blind and lame are equally divine,
And that my steps drag behind yours yet go before them
And are aware that I am with you no more than I am with everybody.”

  l. 992  1855 ’56 ’60 ’67 read “What I give I give out of myself.”

  l. 1024  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 1023 read “The most they offer for mankind and eternity, less than a spirt of my own seminal wet.”

  l. 1025  1855 adds “and laying them away.”

  l. 1027  1855 for “Buddha” reads “Adonia.”

  l. 1030  1855 reads “Honestly taking.”

  l. 1037  1855 reads “more to me.”

  l. 1048  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 1048 read “Guessing when I am it will not tickle me much to receive puffs out of pulpit or print.”

  l. 1056  1855 ’56 ’60 read “their climax and close.”

  l. 1057  1855 reads “evolves on my neck.”

  l. 1073  1855 reads “politics, churches, newspapers, schools.” 1856 ’60 ’67 read “politics, markets, newspapers, schools.”

  l. 1074  1866 reads “markets.”

  l. 1075  1855 ’56 ’60 read “They who piddle and patter here in collars and tailed coats, I am aware who they are, they are not worms or fleas.”

  l. 1076  1867. For “positively” reads “actually.”

  l. 1077  1855 adds “under all the scrape-lipped and pipe-legged concealments.”

  l. 1081  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I know my omnivorous words, and I cannot say any less.”

  1867 reads “cannot write any less.”

  l. 1083  1855 ’56 read “My words are words of a questioning, and to indicate reality.” 1860 adds to above “and motive power.”

  l. 1085  1855 ’56. After line 1085 read

“The marriage estate and settlement, but the body and mind of the bridegroom? also those of the bride?
The Panorama of the sea, but the sea itself?”

  l. 1087  1855 ’56 ’60 read “The fleet of ships of the line and all the modern improvements—but the craft and pluck of the admiral?”

  l. 1088  “In the houses” added in 1867.

  l. 1092  1855 ’56 read “And what is called reason? and what is called love? and what is called life?”

  l. 1111  1855 ’56 ’60 read

“I know every one of you—I know the unspoken interrogatories,
By experience I know them.”

  l. 1116  1855. After line 1117 reads “And the day and night are for you and me and all.” 1856 ’60 read “Day and night are for you, me, all.”

  l. 1117  “precisely the same” added in 1856.

  l. 1119  1855 reads “But I know it is sure and alive and sufficient.” 1856 ’60 read “But I know it is sure alive sufficient.”

  l. 1134  1855 ’56 read, after line 1134,

“Eternity lies in bottomless reservoirs, its buckets are rising forever and ever,
They pour and they pour and they exhale away.”

  l. 1150  1855. After “Nothing” reads “the vapor from the nostrils of death.”

  l. 1151  1855 reads “and slept while God carried me through the lethargic mist.”

  l. 1166  1855 ’56 ’60 read “Now I stand on this spot,” etc.

  l. 1173  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 1173 read “Or while I swim in the bath, or drink from the pump at the corner—or the curtain is down at the opera, or I glimpse at a woman’s face in the railroad car.”

  l. 1177  “O welcome” added in 1860.

  l. 1188  1855 ’56 ’60 read “and all the palpable life, were this moment,” etc.

  l. 1196  1855 reads “Our rendezvous is fitly appointed, God will be there and wait till we come.”

  “it is certain” added in 1867.

  l. 1197  Line 1197 added in 1867.

  l. 1199  “(come listen all!)” added in 1867.

  l. 1212  “dear son” added in 1867.

  l. 1219  “but” added in 1867.

  l. 1222  1855 ’56 ’60 for “dear son” read “wayfarer.”

  l. 1224  1855 ’56 ’60 read “I will certainly kiss you,” etc.

  l. 1237  1855 ’56 ’60 read “worse than a wound cuts.”

  l. 1240  1855 ’56 ’60. For lines 1239–40 read “Preferring scars and faces pitted with small-pox over all latherers and those that keep out of the sun.”

  l. 1246  1855 ’56 read “It was tied,” etc.

  l. 1247  “again” added in 1860.

  l. 1257  1855 reads “words must sail,” etc.

  l. 1260  Lines 1258–59–60 added in 1867.

  l. 1274  1855 ’56 ’60 read “And any man or woman shall stand cool and supercilious before a million universes.”

  l. 1275  1855 ’56 ’60. For “say” read “call.”

  l. 1284  “wheresoe’er I go” added in 1867.

  l. 1304  1855 reads “And perceive of the ghastly glitter the sunbeams reflected.” 1856 reads “And perceive of the ghastly glimmer the sunbeams reflected.” 1860 reads “I perceive of the ghastly glimmer the sunbeams reflected.”

15. Laws for Creations

First published in 1860 as No. 13 “Chants Democratic.”

  l. 5  1860. For lines 4 and 5 reads:

“There shall be no subject but it shall be treated with reference to the ensemble of the world, and the compact truth of the world—And no coward or copyist shall be allowed;
There shall be no subject too pronounced—All works shall illustrate the divine law of indirections;
There they stand—I see them already, each poised and in its place,
Statements, models, censuses, poems, dictionaries, biographies, essays, theories—How complete! How relative and interfused! No one supersedes another;
They do not seem to me like the old specimens,
They seem to me like Nature at last, (America has given birth to them, and I have also;)
They seem to me at last as perfect as the animals, and as the rocks and weeds—fitted to them,
Fitted to the sky, to float with floating clouds—to rustle among the trees with rustling leaves,
To stretch with stretched and level waters, where ships silently sail in the distance.”

16. Visor’d

First published in 1860.

17. To the Garden the World

First published in 1860.

18. From Pent-up Aching Rivers

First published in 1860.

  l. 1  “From pent-up, aching rivers” added in 1867. See also note at line 10.

  l. 10  After line 10, 1860, reads “From the pent-up rivers of myself.”

  l. 13  1860 reads “ten thousand years.”

  l. 15  “even” added in 1867.

  l. 25  1860 ’67. After line 25 read “The slave’s body for sale—I sternly with harsh voice auctioneering.”

  l. 43  1860 reads “who understands me—the girl of The States.”

  l. 60  1860 reads “Celebrate you, enfans prepared for.”

19. I Sing the Body Electric

First published in 1855. In 1856 under title of “Poem of the Body.”

  l. 1  “I sing the body electric” added in 1867. 1860 reads “O my children! O mates!”

  l. 2  1855 ’56 read “The bodies of men and women engirth me and I engirth them.” 1860 reads “O the bodies of you, and of all men and women engirth me,” etc.

  l. 3  1855 reads “and responds to them and love them.” 1856 reads “respond to them love them.”

  l. 4  Line 4, added in 1860, reads “And respond to the contact of them, and discorrupt them,” etc.

  l. 6  1855 reads “Was it doubted if those who corrupt their own live bodies conceal themselves?” 1856 reads “Was it dreamed whether those who corrupted their own live bodies could conceal themselves?” 1860 reads same as ’56, omitting “live.”

  1855. For “if” reads “whether.”

  1855. For “defile” read “defiled.”

  l. 7  Lines 7 and 8 added in 1856.

  l. 9  1855 ’56 read “The expression of the body of man or woman balks account.”

  l. 10  “That of” added in 1860.

  l. 11  Line 11 added in 1860.

  l. 12  “But” added in 1860.

  l. 19  1855 reads “the salt transparent green-shine, or lies on his back, and rolls silently with the heave of the water.” Above reading adopted in 1856 except “to and fro” added in 1860.

  1855  After line 19 reads “Framers bare-armed framing a house, hoisting the beams in their places or using the mallet and mortising chisel.”

  l. 21  1855 reads “in all their exquisite offices.”

  l. 24  1855 reads “The woodman rapidly swinging his axe in the woods, the young fellow,” etc.

  l. 26  1855 reads “The coats, vests and caps,” etc.

  l. 28  1855 reads “waistbands.”

  l. 33  1855 ’56 ’60 read “he was a common farmer, he was the father of five sons.”

  l. 36  1855 ’56 ’60 read “The shape of his head, the richness and breadth of his manners,” etc.

  l. 56  1855 reads “fringed clouds,” etc.

  l. 73  1855 ’56. After line 73 read “I see the bearer of the great fruit which is immortality, the good thereof is not tasted by roues, and never can be.”

  l. 78  1855 ’56. For “wildest” read “fiercest.”

  l. 84  Line 83 in 1855 ’56 is part of line 82 and reads “it is no matter who.” “It is sacred” added in 1860.

  l. 90  “yourself” added in 1860.

  l. 93  “only” added in 1860.

  l. 94  1855 reads “A slave at auction.”

  l. 96  1855. For “wonder” reads “curious creature;” in lines 97, 98, 99, for “it” reads “him.”

  l. 100  1855. For “this” reads “that.”

  l. 101  1855 ’56 ’60 read “the making of the attributes of heroes.”

  l. 102  1855. For “so” reads “very.”

  l. 107  1855 reads “runs his blood.”

  l. 110  1855 reads “his heart.”

  l. 119  1855 ’56 ’60. After line 119 read

“Her daughters or their daughters’ daughters—who knows who shall mate with them?
Who knows through the centuries what heroes may come from them?
In them and of them natal love—in them the divine mystery—the same old beautiful mystery.”

  l. 120  1855 reads “Have you ever loved a woman?”

  l. 121  Lines 121–122 added in 1856.

  l. 125  1855 reads “If life and the soul are sacred.”

  l. 129  After line 129. 1855 reads

“Who degrades or defiles the living human body is cursed,
Who degrades or defiles the body of the dead is not more cursed.”

Which ends the poem of that edition.

  l. 130  Line 130 to end added in 1856.

  l. 131  “(and they are the Soul)” added in 1860.

  l. 159  1856 ’60 read “meat of his own body or another person’s body.”

  l. 165  1856 reads

“O I think these are the soul!
If these are not the soul what is the soul?”