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Leaves of Grass (1871-72)

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I SIT and look out upon all the sorrows of the world,
and upon all oppression and shame;

I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men, at an-
guish with themselves, remorseful after deeds
done;

I see, in low life, the mother misused by her children,
dying, neglected, gaunt, desperate;

I see the wife misused by her husband—I see the
treacherous seducer of young women;

I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love,
attempted to be hid—I see these sights on the
earth;

I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny—I see
martyrs and prisoners;

I observe a famine at sea—I observe the sailors casting
lots who shall be kill'd, to preserve the lives of
the rest;

I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant
persons upon laborers, the poor, and upon ne-
groes, and the like;

All these—All the meanness and agony without end, I
sitting, look out upon,

See, hear, and am silent.

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