Appearances by Walt Whitman

Of the terrible doubt of appearances, / Of the uncertainty after all -- that we may be deluded, / That maybe reliance and hope are but speculations after all, / That maybe identity beyond the grave is a beautiful fable only, / Maybe the things I perceive -- the animals, plants, men, hills, shining and / flowing waters, / The skies of day and night -- colours, densities, forms -- Maybe these are (as / doubtless they are) only apparitions, and the real something has yet to be known; / (How often they dart out of themselves, as if to confound me and mock me! / How often I think neither I know, nor any man knows, aught of them! ) / Maybe seeming to me what they are (as doubtless they indeed but seem) as / from my present point of view -- And might prove (as of course they / would) naught of what they appear, or naught anyhow, from entirely / changed points of view; / -- To me, these, and the like of these, are curiously answered by my lovers, / my dear friends. / When he whom I love travels with me, or sits a long while holding me by the hand, / When the subtle air, the impalpable, the sense that words and reason hold / not, surround us and pervade us, / Then I am charged with untold and untellable wisdom -- I am silent -- I require / nothing further, / I cannot answer the question of appearances, or that of identity beyond the / grave; / But I walk or sit indifferent -- I am satisfied, / He ahold of my hand has completely satisfied me.