I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise,
Regardless of others, ever regardful of others,
Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man,
Stuffed with stuff that is coarse, ans stuffed with the stuff that is fine,
One of the great nations, the nation of many nations – the smallest the same and the larges the same,
A southern soon as a northerner, a planter nonchalant and hospitable,
A Yankee bound my one way . . . . ready for trade . . . . my joints the limberest joints on earth and the sternest joints on earth,
A Kentuckian walking the vale of the Elkhorn in my deerskin leggings,
A boatman over the lakes or bays or along coast . . . . a Hoosier, a Badger, a Buckeye,
A Louisianian or Georgian, a poke-easy from sandhills and pines,
At home on Canadian snowshoes or up in the bush, or with fisherman off Newfoundland,
At home in the fleet if iceboats, sailing with the rest and tacking,
At home on the hills of Vermont or in the woods of Maine or the Texan ranch,
Comrade of Californians . . . . comrade of three northwesterners, loving their big proportions,
Comrade of raftsmen and coalmen – comrade of all who shake hands and welcome to drink and meat;
A learner with simplest, a teacher if the thoughtfulest,
A novice beginning experient of myriads of seasons,
Of every hue and trade and rank, of every caste and religion,
Not merely of the New World but Africa Europe or Asia . . . . a wandering savage,
A farmer, mechanic, or artist . . . . a gentelman, sailor, lover or quaker
A prisoner, fancy-man, rowdy, lawyer, physician or priest.
page 44-45.
>Whitman is everyone of us and he expresses freely in his poem and everyone of us can find them-self in the lines of Whitman. But can Whitman represent the society of the time he lived and how can his writings be still relevant to today’s society?