by Whitman · Cluster: Identity · Free Verse · Eternal Return
Abstract
Meditation on great original souls who appear at intervals, dear and dreadful, fated and misvalued; the prophet/outcast and the price of greatness.
Connections
Archetypes: Prophet, Scapegoat Themes & Concepts: Alienation, Fate and Free Will Forms & Genres: Free Verse
Testo integrale / Full text
Cluster: INSCRIPTIONS
How they are provided for upon the earth, (appearing at intervals,)
How dear and dreadful they are to the earth,
How they inure to themselves as much as to any—what a paradox
appears their age,
How people respond to them, yet know them not,
How there is something relentless in their fate all times,
How all times mischoose the objects of their adulation and reward,
And how the same inexorable price must still be paid for the same
great purchase.