Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Happy Birthday Walt Whitman

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Walt Whitman (May 31, 1819 – March 26, 1892) with a butterfly, photographed by Phillips & Taylor, Philadelphia, 1873 (via the Library of Congress).

When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer

When I heard the learn'd astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts, the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,
When I sitting heard the learned astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.

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