From
Leaves of Grass, by
Walt Whitman:
Me imperturbe, standing at ease in
Nature,
Master of all or
mistress of all,
aplomb in the midst of
irrational things,
Imbued as they,
passive, receptive, silent as they,
Finding my occupation,
poverty, notoriety, foibles,
crimes, less important that I thought,
Me toward the
Mexican sea, or in the Mannahatta or the
Tennessee, or far north or inland,
A river man, or a man of the woods or of any
farm-life of these States or of the
coast, or the lakes of
Kanada,
Me wherever my life is lived, O to be self-balanced for contingencies,
To confront night,
storms, hunger, ridicule,
accidents, rebuffs, as the trees and animals do.