Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, POEM OF REMEMBRANCE FOR A GIRL OR A BOY OF THESE STATES, by WALT WHITMAN


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

POEM OF REMEMBRANCE FOR A GIRL OR A BOY OF THESE STATES, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: You just maturing youth! You male or female!
Last Line: Do you see death, and the approach of death?
Subject(s): Youth


You just maturing youth! You male or female!
Remember the organic compact of These States,
Remember the pledge of the Old Thirteen thenceforward to
the rights, life, liberty, equality of man,
Remember what was promulged by the founders, ratified by
The States, signed in black and white by the
Commissioners, and read by Washington at the head of the army,
Remember the purposes of the founders, -- Remember Washington;
Remember the copious humanity streaming from every
direction toward America;
Remember the hospitality that belongs to nations and men;
(Cursed be nation, woman, man, without hospitality!)
Remember, government is to subserve individuals,
Not any, not the President, is to have one jot more than you or me,
Not any habitan of America is to have one jot less than you or me.

Anticipate when the thirty or fifty millions, are to become
the hundred or two hundred millions, of equal freemen
and freewomen, amicably joined.

Recall ages -- One age is but a part -- ages are but a part;
Recall the angers, bickerings, delusions, superstitions, of
the idea of caste,
Recall the bloody cruelties and crimes.

Anticipate the best women;
I say an unnumbered new race of hardy and well-defined
women are to spread through all These States,
I say a girl fit for These States must be free, capable,
dauntless, just the same as a boy.

Anticipate your own life -- retract with merciless power,
Shirk nothing -- retract in time -- Do you see those
errors, diseases, weaknesses, lies, thefts?
Do you see that lost character? -- Do you see decay,
consumption, rumdrinking, dropsy, fever, mortal cancer
or inflammation?
Do you see death, and the approach of death?





Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!


Other Poems of Interest...
Home: PoetryExplorer.net