A clear midnight

THIS is thy hour O Soul, thy free flight into the wordless,
Away from books, away from art, the day erased, the lesson done,
Thee fully forth emerging, silent, gazing, pondering the themes thou
lovest best.
Night, sleep, death and the stars.

Walt Whitman

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.

Walt Whitman, Song of Myself.

Beautiful women

Women sit, or move to and fro—some old, some young;
The young are beautiful—but the old are more beautiful than the young.

Walt Whitman.