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object:1.whitman - Respondez!
author class:Walt Whitman
subject class:Poetry
book class:Whitman - Poems
class:chapter


. RESPONDEZ! Respondez!
(The war is completedthe price is paidthe title is settled beyond
    recall
Let every one answer! let those who sleep be waked! let none evade!
Must we still go on with our affectations and sneaking?
Let me bring this to a closeI pronounce openly for a new
    distribution of roles;
Let that which stood in front go behind! and let that which was
    behind advance to the front and speak;
Let murderers, bigots, fools, unclean persons, offer new
    propositions!
Let the old propositions be postponed!
Let faces and theories be turn'd inside out! let meanings be freely
    criminal, as well as results!
Let there be no suggestion above the suggestion of drudgery!


Let none be pointed toward his destination! (Say! do you know your
    destination?)
Let men and women be mock'd with bodies and mock'd with Souls!
Let the love that waits in them, wait! let it die, or pass stillborn
    to other spheres!
Let the sympathy that waits in every man, wait! or let it also pass,
    a dwarf, to other spheres!
Let contradictions prevail! let one thing contradict another! and let
    one line of my poems contradict another!
Let the people sprawl with yearning, aimless hands! let their tongues
    be broken! let their eyes be discouraged! let none descend into
    their hearts with the fresh lusciousness of love!
(Stifled, O days! O lands! in every public and private corruption!
Smother'd in thievery, impotence, shamelessness, mountain-high;
Brazen effrontery, scheming, rolling like ocean's waves around and
    upon you, O my days! my lands!
For not even those thunderstorms, nor fiercest lightnings of the war,
    have purified the atmosphere              


Let the theory of America still be management, caste, comparison!
    (Say! what other theory would you?)
Let them that distrust birth and death still lead the rest! (Say! why
    shall they not lead you?)
Let the crust of hell be neared and trod on! let the days be darker
    than the nights! let slumber bring less slumber than waking
    time brings!
Let the world never appear to him or her for whom it was all made!
Let the heart of the young man still exile itself from the heart of
    the old man! and let the heart of the old man be exiled from
    that of the young man!
Let the sun and moon go! let scenery take the applause of the
    audience! let there be apathy under the stars!
Let freedom prove no man's inalienable right! every one who can
    tyrannize, let him tyrannize to his satisfaction!
Let none but infidels be countenanced!
Let the eminence of meanness, treachery, sarcasm, hate, greed,
    indecency, impotence, lust, be taken for granted above all! let
    writers, judges, governments, households, religions,
    philosophies, take such for granted above all!
Let the worst men beget children out of the worst women!    


Let the priest still play at immortality!
Let death be inaugurated!
Let nothing remain but the ashes of teachers, artists, moralists,
    lawyers, and learn'd and polite persons!
Let him who is without my poems be assassinated!
Let the cow, the horse, the camel, the garden-beelet the mudfish,
    the lobster, the mussel, eel, the sting-ray, and the grunting
    pig-fishlet these, and the like of these, be put on a perfect
    equality with man and woman!
Let churches accommodate serpents, vermin, and the corpses of those
    who have died of the most filthy of diseases!
Let marriage slip down among fools, and be for none but fools!
Let men among themselves talk and think forever obscenely of women!
    and let women among themselves talk and think obscenely of men!
Let us all, without missing one, be exposed in public, naked,
    monthly, at the peril of our lives! let our bodies be freely
    handled and examined by whoever chooses!
Let nothing but copies at second hand be permitted to exist upon the
    earth!                          


Let the earth desert God, nor let there ever henceforth be mention'd
    the name of God!
Let there be no God!
Let there be money, business, imports, exports, custom, authority,
    precedents, pallor, dyspepsia, smut, ignorance, unbelief!
Let judges and criminals be transposed! let the prison-keepers be put
    in prison! let those that were prisoners take the keys! Say!
    why might they not just as well be transposed?)
Let the slaves be masters! let the masters become slaves!
Let the reformers descend from the stands where they are forever
    bawling! let an idiot or insane person appear on each of the
    stands!
Let the Asiatic, the African, the European, the American, and the
    Australian, go armed against the murderous stealthiness of each
    other! let them sleep armed! let none believe in good will!
Let there be no unfashionable wisdom! let such be scorn'd and derided
    off from the earth!
Let a floating cloud in the skylet a wave of the sealet growing
    mint, spinach, onions, tomatoeslet these be exhibited as
    shows, at a great price for admission!
Let all the men of These States stand aside for a few smouchers! let
    the few seize on what they choose! let the rest gawk, giggle,
    starve, obey!                        


Let shadows be furnish'd with genitals! let substances be deprived of
    their genitals!
Let there be wealthy and immense citiesbut still through any of
    them, not a single poet, savior, knower, lover!
Let the infidels of These States laugh all faith away!
If one man be found who has faith, let the rest set upon him!
Let them affright faith! let them destroy the power of breeding
    faith!
Let the she-harlots and the he-harlots be prudent! let them dance on,
    while seeming lasts! (O seeming! seeming! seeming!)
Let the preachers recite creeds! let them still teach only what they
    have been taught!
Let insanity still have charge of sanity!
Let books take the place of trees, animals, rivers, clouds!
Let the daub'd portraits of heroes supersede heroes!      


Let the manhood of man never take steps after itself!
Let it take steps after eunuchs, and after consumptive and genteel
    persons!
Let the white person again tread the black person under his heel!
    (Say! which is trodden under heel, after all?)
Let the reflections of the things of the world be studied in mirrors!
    let the things themselves still continue unstudied!
Let a man seek pleasure everywhere except in himself!
Let a woman seek happiness everywhere except in herself!
(What real happiness have you had one single hour through your whole
    life?)
Let the limited years of life do nothing for the limitless years of
    death! (What do you suppose death will do, then?)






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1.whitman - Respondez!
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