University of Virginia Library

31   O my Body! I dare not desert the likes of you in      other men and women, nor the likes of the      parts of you ;
I believe the likes of you are to stand or fall with the      likes of the Soul, (and that they are the Soul;)
I believe the likes of you shall stand or fall with my      poems — and that they are poems,
Man's, woman's, child's, youth's, wife's, husband's,      mother's, father's, young man's, young woman's      poems ;
Head, neck, hair, ears, drop and tympan of the ears,
Eyes, eye-fringes, iris of the eye, eye-brows, and the      waking or sleeping of the lids,
Mouth, tongue, lips, teeth, roof of the mouth, jaws,      and the jaw-hinges,
Nose, nostrils of the nose, and the partition,
Cheeks, temples, forehead, chin, throat, back of the      neck, neck-slue,
Strong shoulders, manly beard, scapula, hind-shoul-     ders, and the ample side-round of the chest,
Upper-arm, arm-pit, elbow-socket, lower-arm, arm-     sinews, arm-bones,
Wrist and wrist-joints, hand, palm, knuckles, thumb,      fore-finger, finger-balls, finger-joints, finger-     nails,
Broad breast-front, curling hair of the breast, breast-     bone, breast-side,
Ribs, belly, backbone, joints of the back-bone,
Hips, hip-sockets, hip-strength, inward and outward      round, man-balls, man-root,
Strong set of thighs, well carrying the trunk above,
Leg-fibres, knee, knee-pan, upper-leg, under-leg,
Ankles, instep, foot-ball, toes, toe-joints, the heel ;
All attitudes, all the shapeliness, all the belongings of      my or your body, or of any one's body, male or      female,
The lung-sponges, the stomach-sac, the bowels sweet      and clean,
The brain in its folds inside the skull-frame,
Sympathies, heart-valves, palate-valves, sexuality, ma-     ternity,
Womanhood, and all that is a woman — and the man      that comes from woman,
The womb, the teats, nipples, breast-milk, tears, laugh-     ter, weeping, love-looks, love-perturbations and      risings,
The voice, articulation, language, whispering, shout-     ing aloud,
Food, drink, pulse, digestion, sweat, sleep, walking,      swimming,
Poise on the hips, leaping, reclining, embracing, arm-     curving and tightening,
The continual changes of the flex of the mouth, and      around the eyes,
The skin, the sun-burnt shade, freckles, hair,
The curious sympathy one feels, when feeling with the      hand the naked meat of the body,
The circling rivers, the breath, and breathing it in      and out,
The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and      thence downward toward the knees,
The thin red jellies within you, or within me — the      bones, and the marrow in the bones,
The exquisite realization of health ;
O I say, these are not the parts and poems of the Body      only, but of the Soul,
O I say now these are the Soul!