Leaves of Grass (1871-72)

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EARTH! my likeness!

Though you look so impassive, ample spheric
there,

I now suspect that is not all;

I now suspect there is something fierce in you, eligible
to burst forth;

For an athlete is enamour'd of me—and I of him;

But toward him there is something fierce and terrible
in me, eligible to burst forth,

I dare not tell it in words—not even in these songs.

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