Explore "Starting from Paumanok" by Walt Whitman on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
1. Starting from fish-shape Paumanok,[1] where I was born, / Well-begotten, and raised by a perfect mother; / After roaming many lands -- lover of populous pavements; / Dweller in Mannahatta,[2] city of ships, my city, -- or on southern savannas; / Or a soldier camped, or carrying my knapsack and gun -- or a miner in / California; / Or rude in my home in Dakotah's woods, my diet meat, my drink from the spring; / Or withdrawn to muse and meditate in some deep recess, / Far from the clank of crowds, intervals passing, rapt and happy; / Aware of the fresh free giver, the flowing Missouri -- aware of mighty Niagara / Aware of the buffalo herds, grazing the plains -- the hirsute and strong-breasted bull; / Of earths, rocks, fifth-month flowers, experienced -- stars, rain, snow, my amaze; / Having studied the mocking-bird's tones, and the mountain hawk's, / And heard at dusk the unrivalled one, the hermit thrush, from the swamp-cedars, / Solitary, singing in the West, I strike up for a New World.
2. Victory, union, faith, identity, time, / Yourself, the present and future lands, the indissoluble compacts, riches, mystery, / Eternal progress, the kosmos, and the modern reports.