Burial

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Title:     Burial
Author: Walt Whitman [More Titles by Whitman]

1.

To think of it!

To think of time--of all that retrospection!

To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward!

Have you guessed you yourself would not continue?

Have you dreaded these earth-beetles?

Have you feared the future would be nothing to you?

Is to-day nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing?

If the future is nothing, they are just as surely nothing.

To think that the sun rose in the east! that men and women were flexible, real, alive! that everything was alive!

To think that you and I did not see, feel, think, nor bear our part!

To think that we are now here, and bear our part!

 

2.

Not a day passes--not a minute or second, without an accouchement!

Not a day passes-not a minute or second, without a corpse!

The dull nights go over, and the dull days also,

The soreness of lying so much in bed goes over,

The physician, after long putting off, gives the silent and terrible look for an answer,

The children come hurried and weeping, and the brothers and sisters are sent for;

Medicines stand unused on the shelf--(the camphor-smell has long pervaded the rooms,)

The faithful hand of the living does not desert the hand of the dying,

The twitching lips press lightly on the forehead of the dying,

The breath ceases, and the pulse of the heart ceases,

The corpse stretches on the bed, and the living look upon it,

It is palpable as the living are palpable.

The living look upon the corpse with their eyesight,

But without eyesight lingers a different living, and looks curiously on the corpse.

3.

To think that the rivers will flow, and the snow fall, and the fruits ripen, and act upon others as upon us now--yet not act upon us!

To think of all these wonders of city and country, and others taking great interest in them--and we taking--no interest in them!

To think how eager we are in building our houses!

To think others shall be just as eager, and we quite indifferent!

I see one building the house that serves him a few years, or seventy or eighty years at most,

I see one building the house that serves him longer than that.

Slow-moving and black lines creep over the whole earth--they never cease--they are the burial lines;

He that was President was buried, and he that is now President shall surely be buried.

4.

Gold dash of waves at the ferry-wharf--posh and ice in the river, half-frozen mud in the streets, a grey discouraged sky overhead, the short last daylight of Twelfth-month,

A hearse and stages--other vehicles give place--the funeral of an old Broadway stage-driver, the cortege mostly drivers.

Steady the trot to the cemetery, duly rattles the death-bell, the gate is passed, the new-dug grave is halted at, the living alight, the hearse uncloses,

The coffin is passed out, lowered, and settled, the whip is laid on the coffin, the earth is swiftly shovelled in,

The mound above is flattened with the spades--silence,

A minute, no one moves or speaks--it is done,

He is decently put away--is there anything more?

He was a good fellow, free-mouthed, quick-tempered, not bad-looking, able to take his own part, witty, sensitive to a slight, ready with life or death for a friend, fond of women, gambled, ate hearty, drank hearty, had known what it was to be flush, grew low-spirited toward the last, sickened, was helped by a contribution, died, aged forty- one years--and that was his funeral.

Thumb extended, finger uplifted, apron, cape, gloves, strap, wet-weather clothes, whip carefully chosen, boss, spotter, starter, hostler, somebody loafing on you, you loafing on somebody, headway, man before and man behind, good day's work, bad day's work, pet stock, mean stock, first out, last out, turning-in at night;

To think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers--and he there takes no interest in them!

5.

The markets, the government, the working-man's wages--to think what account they are through our nights and days!

To think that other working-men will make just as great account of them--yet we make little or no account!

The vulgar and the refined--what you call sin, and what you call goodness--to think how wide a difference!

To think the difference will still continue to others, yet we lie beyond the difference.

To think how much pleasure there is!

Have you pleasure from looking at the sky? have you pleasure from poems?

Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in business? or planning a nomination and election? or with your wife and family?

Or with your mother and sisters? or in womanly housework? or the beautiful maternal cares?

These also flow onward to others--you and I fly onward,

But in due time you and I shall take less interest in them.

Your farm, profits, crops,--to think how engrossed you are!

To think there will still be farms, profits, crops--yet for you, of what avail?

6.

What will be will be well--for what is is well;

To take interest is well, and not to take interest shall be well.

The sky continues beautiful,

The pleasure of men with women shall never be sated, nor the pleasure of women with men, nor the pleasure from poems;

The domestic joys, the daily housework or business, the building of houses--these are not phantasms--they have weight, form, location;

Farms, profits, crops, markets, wages, government, are none of them phantasms;

The difference between sin and goodness is no delusion,

The earth is not an echo--man and his life, and all the things of his life, are well-considered.

You are not thrown to the winds--you gather certainly and safely around yourself;

Yourself! Yourself! Yourself, for ever and ever!

7.

It is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and father--it is to identify you;

It is not that you should be undecided, but that you should be decided;

Something long preparing and formless is arrived and formed in you,

You are henceforth secure, whatever comes or goes.

The threads that were spun are gathered, the weft crosses the warp, the pattern is systematic.

The preparations have every one been justified,

The orchestra have sufficiently tuned their instruments--the baton has given the signal.

The guest that was coming--he waited long, for reasons--he is now housed;

He is one of those who are beautiful and happy--he is one of those that to look upon and be with is enough.

The law of the past cannot be eluded,

The law of the present and future cannot be eluded,

The law of the living cannot be eluded--it is eternal;

The law of promotion and transformation cannot be eluded,
The law of heroes and good-doers cannot be eluded,

The law of drunkards, informers, mean persons--not one iota thereof can be eluded.

 

8.

Slow-moving and black lines go ceaselessly over the earth,

Northerner goes carried, and Southerner goes carried, and they on the Atlantic side, and they on the Pacific, and they between, and all through the Mississippi country, and all over the earth.

The great masters and kosmos are well as they go--the heroes and good-doers are well,

The known leaders and inventors, and the rich owners and pious and distinguished, may be well,

But there is more account than that--there is strict account of all.

The interminable hordes of the ignorant and wicked are not nothing,

The barbarians of Africa and Asia are not nothing,

The common people of Europe are not nothing--the American aborigines are not nothing,

The infected in the immigrant hospital are not nothing--the murderer or mean person is not nothing,

The perpetual successions of shallow people are not nothing as they go,

The lowest prostitute is not nothing--the mocker of religion is not nothing as he goes.

9.

I shall go with the rest--we have satisfaction,

I have dreamed that we are not to be changed so much, nor the law of us changed,

I have dreamed that heroes and good-doers shall be under the present and past law,

And that murderers, drunkards, liars, shall be under the present and past law,

For I have dreamed that the law they are under now is enough.

And I have dreamed that the satisfaction is not so much changed, and that there is no life without satisfaction;

What is the earth? what are Body and Soul without satisfaction?

I shall go with the rest,

We cannot be stopped at a given point--that is no satisfaction,

To show us a good thing, or a few good things, for a space of time--that is no satisfaction,

We must have the indestructible breed of the best, regardless of time.

If otherwise, all these things came but to ashes of dung,

If maggots and rats ended us, then alarum! for we are betrayed!

Then indeed suspicion of death.

Do you suspect death? If I were to suspect death, I should die now:

Do you think I could walk pleasantly and well-suited toward annihilation?

 

10.

Pleasantly and well-suited I walk:

Whither I walk I cannot define, but I know it is good;

The whole universe indicates that it is good,

The past and the present indicate that it is good.

How beautiful and perfect are the animals! How perfect is my Soul!

How perfect the earth, and the minutest thing upon it!

What is called good is perfect, and what is called bad is just as perfect,

The vegetables and minerals are all perfect, and the imponderable fluids are perfect;

Slowly and surely they have passed on to this, and slowly and surely they yet pass on.

My Soul! if I realise you, I have satisfaction;

Animals and vegetables! if I realise you, I have satisfaction;

Laws of the earth and air! if I realise you, I have satisfaction.

I cannot define my satisfaction, yet it is so;

I cannot define my life, yet it is so.

 

11.

It comes to me now!

I swear I think now that everything without exception has an eternal soul!

The trees have, rooted in the ground! the weeds of the sea have! the animals!

I swear I think there is nothing but immortality!

That the exquisite scheme is for it, and the nebulous float is for it, and the cohering is for it;

And all preparation is for it! and identity is for it! and life and death are altogether for it!

[The end]
Walt Whitman's poem: Burial

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