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Poetry Manuscripts

Table of Contents

leaf 1 recto

sent H May 19

pub'd

The two old _^ simple problems ever

For e E ver intertwined

_^ Close home, Elusive, simple, present, baffled, grappled, foil'd baffled,

For By [about two letters deleted, illegible] each successive age pass'd on

insoluble, pass'd on,

To ours to-day—and we pass on. the same

Date: This manuscript was probably composed in the spring of 1888 shortly before it was published.

Editorial note: This manuscript is a draft of "Life and Death," which was published first in the New York Herald, May 23, 1888.; The verso of the manuscript leaf is blank.

Location: Life and Death | The Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839-1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

The Walt Whitman Archive