Thursday, July 16, 2009

A Word from Walt


Yesterday I ran across a favorite set of lines from Walt Whitman, part of his "Song of Myself". So here they are, without adornment or commentary from me:

I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so placid and self-contain'd,
I stand and look at them long and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition,
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,
Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owning things,
Not one kneels to another nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago,
Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.

Image: a sketch of Digory snoozing, August 2007.

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