Från Leaves of Grass av Walt Whitman

Foto: Matt Lavin

-----   I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their laps.

What do you think have become of the young and old men?
And what do you think have become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it,
And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.  

31
I believe a leaf of grass is no less than a jouney-work of the stars,
....
I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth,I am the mate and companion of people, all justas immortal and fathomless as myself;They do not know how immortal, but I know. Walt Whitman