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 | Leaves of grass. |  |
NOT YOUTH PERTAINS TO ME.
NOT youth pertains to me,
Nor delicatesse — I cannot beguile the time with talk;
Awkward in the parlor, neither a dancer nor elegant;
In the learn'd coterie sitting constrain'd and still — for learning inures not to me;
Beauty, knowledge, fortune, inure not to me — yet there are two things inure to me;
I have nourish'd the wounded, and sooth'd many a dying soldier;
And at intervals I have strung together a few songs,
Fit for war, and the life of the camp.
Nor delicatesse — I cannot beguile the time with talk;
Awkward in the parlor, neither a dancer nor elegant;
In the learn'd coterie sitting constrain'd and still — for learning inures not to me;
Beauty, knowledge, fortune, inure not to me — yet there are two things inure to me;
I have nourish'd the wounded, and sooth'd many a dying soldier;
And at intervals I have strung together a few songs,
Fit for war, and the life of the camp.
FINIS.
| Leaves of grass. | |