Walt Whitman Poetry

TEARS! tears! tears!
In the night, in solitude, tears;
On the white shore dripping, dripping, suck'd in by the sand;
Tears-not a star shining-all dark and desolate;
Moist tears from the eyes of a muffled head:
—O who is that ghost?-that form in the dark, with tears?
What shapeless lump is that, bent, crouch'd there on the sand?
Streaming tears-sobbing tears-throes, choked with wild cries;
O storm, embodied, rising, careering, with swift steps along the beach;
O wild and dismal night storm, with wind! O belching and desperate!
O shade, so sedate and decorous by day, with calm countenance and regulated pace;
But away, at night, as you fly, none looking-O then the unloosen'd ocean,
Of tears! tears! tears!

Poet: Walt Whitman