“I meet new Walt Whitmans everyday. There are a dozen of them afloat. I don't know which Walt Whitman I am.”
“Be composed--be at ease with me--I am Walt Whitman, liberal and lusty as Nature, Not till the sun excludes you do I exclude you, Not till the waters refuse to glisten for you and the leaves to rustle for you, do my words refuse to glisten and rustle for you. ”
“I am to wait, I do not doubt I am to meet you again / I am to see to it that I do not lose you”
“I am not to speak to you, I am to think of you when I sit alone or wake at night alone, I am to wait, I do not doubt I am to meet you again, I am to see to it that I do not lose you.”
“I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me,The first I graft and increase upon myself, the latter I translateinto a new tongue.”
“Songs of myselfI am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul, The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me, The first I graft and increase upon myself, the latter I translate into new tongue. I am the poet of the woman the same as the man, And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man,..”
“You will hardly know who I am or what I mean”