Walt Whitman (1819-1892)
The World below the Brine
1The world below the brine,
2Forests at the bottom of the sea, the branches and leaves,
3Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seeds, the thick tangle openings, and pink turf,
4Different colors, pale gray and green, purple, white, and gold, the play of light through the water,
5Dumb swimmers there among the rocks, coral, gluten, grass, rushes, and the aliment of the swimmers,
6Sluggish existences grazing there suspended, or slowly crawling close to the bottom,
7The sperm-whale at the surface blowing air and spray, or disporting with his flukes,
8The leaden-eyed shark, the walrus, the turtle, the hairy sea-leopard, and the sting-ray,
9Passions there, wars, pursuits, tribes, sight in those ocean-depths, breathing that thick-breathing air, as so many do,
10The change thence to the sight here, and to the subtle air breathed by beings like us who walk this sphere,
11The change onward from ours to that of beings who walk other spheres.
Notes
7] flukes: the two halves of the whale's tail.
Online text copyright © 2009, Ian Lancashire (the Department of English) and the University of Toronto.
Published by the Web Development Group, Information Technology Services, University of Toronto Libraries.
Original text: Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1891-92): 206-07. PS 3201 1891 Robarts Library.
First publication date:
1860
RPO poem editor: Ian Lancashire
RP edition: RPO 1998.
Recent editing: 2:2002/2/20
Composition date:
1860
Rhyme: unrhyming
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