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26 I have pried through the strata and analyzed to a hair, And counselled with doctors and calculated close and found no sweeter fat than sticks to my own bones.

In all people I see myself, none more and not one a barleycorn less, And the good or bad I say of myself I say of them.

And I know I am solid and sound, To me the converging objects of the universe perpetually flow, All are written to me, and I must get what the writing means.

And I know I am deathless, I know this orbit of mine cannot be swept by a carpenter’s compass, I know I shall not pass like a child’s carlacue cut with a burnt stick at night.

I know I am august, I do not trouble my spirit to vindicate itself or be understood, I see that the elementary laws never apologize, I reckon I behave no prouder than the level I plant my house by after all.

I exist as I am, that is enough, If no other in the world be aware I sit content, And if each and all be aware I sit content.

One world is aware, and by far the largest to me, and that is myself, And whether I come to my own today or in ten thousand or ten million years, I can cheerfully take it now, or with equal cheerfulness I can wait.

My foothold is tenoned and mortised in granite, I laugh at what you call dissolution, And I know the amplitude of time.

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 translate into a 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, And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men.

I chant a new chant of dilation or pride, We have had ducking and deprecating about enough, I show that size is only developement.