Song of Myself
I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you
I loafe and invite my soul
I lean and loafe at my ease
observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood,
form'd from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here
from parents the same, and their parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are
but never forgotten
(excerpt from the beginning