World Poetry Classic Whitman: My Own Song

Walt Whitman (May 31, 1819 – March 26, 1892), born on Governor's Island, New York, was a famous American poet and humanist who created the Free Verse, whose representative work was the poetry collection Leaves of Grass.

My own songs

(Excerpt)

One

I praise myself, I sing about myself,

What I bear will also be borne by you,

For every atom that belongs to me also belongs to you.

I wandered around and invited my soul,

I leaned over and looked at a summer blade of grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, is formed in this soil, in this air.

It was born here, the parents of the parents were born here, and so were their parents.

I, now thirty-seven years old, have been born in a very healthy body,

Hope will always be so, until death.

Creeds and schools aside for the time being,

And take a step back, knowing that their current situation is enough, but it is by no means forgotten,

Whether I am good or evil, I allow my opinions to be expressed at will,

Go with the flow and keep the original vitality.

Two

The house and the room are full of fragrance, and the bookshelves are also crowded with fragrance,

I breathed the scent myself, I knew it and loved it,

Its essence will also enchant me, but I will not allow it.

The atmosphere is not an aromatic, there is no smell of spices, it is odorless,

It will always be for my mouth, I love it,

I'm going to go to the riverbank of the forest, take off the disguise, stripe,

I fanatically want it to come into contact with me.

The clouds of my own breath,

Echoes, thin waves, whispers, love roots, silk threads, branches and vines,

My breathing and inhaling, the beating of my heart, the blood and air flowing through my lungs,

Smell the green leaves and dead leaves, the hay in the coast and black seaside rocks and barns,

The sound of words bursting out of my throat drifted in the whirlpool of the wind,

A few light kisses, a few hugs, an arm outstretched trying to hold something,

The soft strips of branches swing time and shadow in the tree game,

The pleasure of living alone in the downtown area or along the fields and hillsides,

The feeling of health, the vibrato at noon, the song I sang when I got up from bed to meet the sun.

Do you think a thousand acres is a lot? Do you think the Earth is big?

Have you practiced for a long time to learn to read?

Are you proud because you want to try to understand the meaning of poetry?

Stay with me today and tonight, and you will understand the source of all the poetry,

You will possess the benefits of the earth and the sun (plus millions of suns),

You will no longer accept things second or third, nor will you observe through the eyes of the dead or draw nourishment from the ghosts in books.

You will not observe through my eyes, nor will you accept things through me,

You will listen to all aspects, filtering everything by yourself.

Three

I've heard talkers talking, talking about beginnings and ends.

But I don't talk about beginnings and ends.

As now, there was never a beginning in the past.

As now, it doesn't matter whether you are young or old,

As it is now, there will never be perfection,

As now, there will be no heaven or hell.

Impulsive, impulsive, impulsive,

Always the impulse of the world's fertility.

The opposing counterparts that emerge from the darkness are advancing, always matter and proliferation, always sexual activity,

It is always the knot of identity, there is always a difference, it is always the reproduction of life.

It is useless to say that it is useless, and people who have learned and unlearned feel this way.

Surely it is very certain, vertical is absolutely straight, buckled tightly, between the beams and wood to be aligned,

Robust as a horse, affectionate, arrogant, with electricity,

I stand here with this mysterious fact.

My soul is clear and sweet, and everything that does not belong to my soul is also clear and sweet.

Missing one is missing two, and the invisible is confirmed by the visible,

When visible becomes invisible, it is also confirmed.

Pointing out that the best and the worst are the troubles that this generation brings to the next,

Recognizing the perfect alignment and balance of things, I remained silent as they talked, and I went to take a shower and admire myself.

I welcome every organ and trait of mine, and I welcome any warm and clean person – his organ and trait,

No inch or minute of an inch is evil, and nothing should be as familiar as the rest.

I'm content – I can see, dance, laugh, sing;

Those who fell asleep next to me all night, hugged me, loved my bedmates, and quietly left in the morning,

Left me a few baskets covered with white towels, and with their abundance made the house look spacious,

Should I be slow to accept, not realize, but angry at my eyes,

Let them turn back and not allow them to look around on the main road,

And immediately asked for a calculation for me, pointing out without a penny,

Which is at the forefront of the exact value of one thing or the exact value of two things?

Four

Passers-by and questioning people surrounded me,

What people I met, how my early life affected me, what region, what city or country I lived in,

Several recent important dates, discoveries, inventions, societies, old and new writers,

My food, clothing, communication, looks, to whom to pay homage, obligation,

Whether a certain man or woman I love is really cold to me or just my imagination,

My family or myself are sick, contributing to unhealthy tendencies, losing or lacking money, discouraged or overwhelmed,

Confrontation, the horror of war between brothers, uneasiness caused by suspicious news,

events that occur from time to time and are irregular,

Day and night these come upon me and depart from me,

But none of this is the "me" itself.

Despite the pull, I still stand as I am,

Feeling amused, complacent, compassionate, idle, single,

Overlooking. Standing upright, or bending the arm on an invisible and reliable arm support,

Turning his head to the side, curious, wondering what the next thing would be,

Inside and outside at the same time, watching and guessing.

Looking back at how linguists and orators and I spent time sweating in the fog,

I neither laugh nor argue, I watch and wait.

Five

I believe in you, my soul, and I must not bow down to you,

Nor should you bow down to him.

Please take a leisurely stroll along the grass with me, and loosen the blockage in your throat,

I don't want words, music or rhymes, not conventions or speeches, not even the best.

All I like is the temporary silence, the low groan of your restrained voice.

I remember how we slept together on such a bright summer morning at one point,

How you put your head across my hips and flipped gently over me,

And unbuttoned my shirt from my chest and probed my naked heart with your tongue,

Until you touched my beard, until you held my feet.

The eloquent peace and understanding that transcend all eloquence on earth immediately rises and spreads around me,

I know that the hand of God is my own promise,

I know that the Spirit of God is my own brother,

All the men of the world are also my brothers, and all the women are my sisters and lovers,

The wood that is created to strengthen the keel is love,

The leaves standing upright or bowed in the field are endless,

In the hole under the leaf are brown ants,

There are also moss marks on curved rails, piles of rocks, elderberries, hairy flowers and Shanglu.

One seven

These are actually the thoughts of all times, all regions, all people, not my originality.

If it is only my thoughts and not yours, it is meaningless, or meaningless.

If they are neither riddles nor riddles, they will be meaningless,

If they are not both near and far, they are meaningless.

This is the grass that grows where there is land and water.

This is bathed in the common air of the globe.

Two-one

I am a poet of the flesh and a poet of the soul,

I possess the pleasures of heaven and the pains of hell,

The former I grafted it on myself to multiply it, and the latter I translated it into a new language.

I am a poet of both men and poets of women,

I mean as great as being a woman and as a man,

I mean there's nothing greater than people's mothers.

I sing the praises of "expansion" or "pride",

We have bowed our heads and begged for enough,

I am indicating that volume is nothing more than the result of development.

Have you already surpassed the rest of the people? Are you president?

This is trivial, and everyone will cross this point and move on.

I am the one who walks with the gentle and darkening night,

I called out to the earth and the ocean, which was half mastered by the night.

Please hold close, the night with your breasts bare - hold tight, the night full of strength and nourishment!

Night of the South Wind – Night with Huge Stars!

The silent and dozing night ——- crazy and naked summer night.

Smile! Ah, enchanting, cool earth!

The earth is full of sleeping sap-filled trees!

The earth where the sun has set in the west - the land with the mountain peaks covered in fog!

The crystals of the full moon are slightly blue with the earth!

The tide in the river hides the light and the dark earth!

The earth is shrouded in more clear gray clouds for me!

Distant mountains connect to the plains of the earth - the land full of apple blossoms!

Smile, your lover is coming.

Prodigal son, you gave me love – and therefore I gave you love too!

Ah, unspeakable, fiery love.

twenty-two

You sea! I also entrusted myself to you - I guessed your heart,

I saw your curved, inviting fingers by the beach,

I'm sure you won't go back without touching me,

We had to circle around together, and I took off my clothes and hurried away from the land.

Please support me with a cushion, please shake me in the sleepy waves,

Splash it on me with amorous water, and I can repay you,

The sea with its boundless waves,

Breathe wide and nervously into the sea,

The sea is the salt water of life, and it is a grave that is ready to be used without digging,

The trumpeters and scoops of the storm, the wayward and light sea,

I am an integral part of you, and so am I, both one and all.

I share the ebb and flow of your tides, praise hatred and reconciliation,

Praise the camaraderie and those who sleep in each other's arms.

I am the witness of compassion,

(Should I make a list of things in my house and leave it out of the house that sustains it all?) ）

I am not only a poet of "goodness", but also a poet of "evil".

What is the point of this blurted out empty talk about virtue and sin?

Evil pushes me, and the correction of evil also pushes me, and I am impartial,

My footwork shows that I am neither picky nor negative of anything,

I wet all the sprouts that have grown.

Are you afraid of getting lymphatic tuberculosis during a long pregnancy?

Are you guessing that the divine law needs to be re-studied and revised?

I find that one side is a certain balance, and the opposite side is also a certain balance.

Both soft doctrines and stable doctrines are necessarily beneficial,

Current thoughts and actions enable us to rise up and get started early.

After hundreds of millions of moments in the past and coming to me at this moment,

There is nothing more perfect than it, than the present.

It is not a miracle that what was done right in the past or what is done right today is not a miracle.

It is always surprising that there will be villains or non-religious people in the world.

Two five

The dazzling and intense morning sun, how quickly it will put me to death,

If I can't always lift a rising sun from my heart at this time.

We will also rise as bright and extraordinary as the sun,

Ah, my soul, we have found our own home in the tranquility and coolness of the breaking dawn.

My voice tracks where our country can't reach,

As soon as my tongue rolled up, it embraced the vast world and the vast world.

Language is the twin of my vision, it cannot measure itself,

It is always provocative to me, saying in a sarcastic tone:

"Walter, you contain enough stuff, why don't you release it?"

Well, I will not accept your teasing, you take the ability to express language too seriously,

Ah, language, don't you know how the buds below you are tightly closed?

Waiting in the darkness, protected by severe frost,

The dirt is retreating with the screams of my prophet,

I was able to settle for the inner cause of things in the end,

My awareness is my active part, it is constantly connected with the meaning of everything,

Happiness, (Please, the men and women who heard me start looking for it today.) ）

I will never tell you what my greatest strength is, I will never divulge what kind of person I really am,

Please be all-encompassing, but don't try to include me,

As long as I look at you, I can squeeze into your smoothest and most wonderful things.

Words and words are not enough to prove me,

I had plenty of evidence and everything else on my face.

As soon as my lips were closed, the skeptics were utterly helpless.

May

The past and the present have withered - I have made them full, and I have made them empty,

And then fill the life that will continue behind you.

Listener standing over there! What secret do you have to tell me?

Look at my face as I extinguish the oblique light of dusk,

(To be honest, no one else will hear you, and I'll just have to stay a minute.) ）

Am I contradicting myself?

Well, I'm contradictory.

(I'm vast, I'm all-encompassing.) ）

I concentrated on the near object, and I waited on the stone slab in front of the door.

Who has finished his day's work? Who can finish dinner as quickly as possible?

Who wants to take a walk with me?

Are you willing to speak before I go? Will it be too late for you?

Five-two

The goshawk swept past me and rebuked me, and he blamed me for rapping and for not leaving.

I'm not docile at all, and I'm not translatable either.

I let out a rough shout on the roof of the world.

The last daylight of the day stays for me,

It threw my shadow behind the other shadows and, like everything else, in the wilderness of the shadows,

It tempted me toward the smoke and dusk.

I walked away like air, and I shook my gray hair against the fleeing sun,

I melted my flesh into a whirlpool and let it float in a lace-like crack.

I surrender myself to the dirt and let it grow in my beloved grass,

If you need me again, look for me under your boots.

You will not be very clear about who I am and what I mean.

But I tell you, it will still be good for your health,

It will also filter and fill your blood.

If you can't find me for a while, don't be discouraged,

If you can't find one place, look for it somewhere else,

I'm always waiting for you somewhere.

(Translated by Zhao Luorui)