by Whitman · Cluster: Self-Knowledge · Immortality · Self-Reliance
Abstract
A free-verse lyric using the weaving metaphor to urge ceaseless labor of life in campaigns of peace and war; themes of the soldier, work and life-as-struggle.
Connections
Motifs: Death, Blood Themes & Concepts: Self-Knowledge, War and its Cost Forms & Genres: Lyric
Testo integrale / Full text
Cluster: FROM NOON TO STARRY NIGHT
Weave in, weave in, my hardy life,
Weave yet a soldier strong and full for great campaigns to come,
Weave in red blood, weave sinews in like ropes, the senses, sight weave in,
Weave lasting sure, weave day and night the wet, the warp, incessant
weave, tire not,
(We know not what the use O life, nor know the aim, the end, nor
really aught we know,
But know the work, the need goes on and shall go on, the
death-envelop’d march of peace as well as war goes on,)
For great campaigns of peace the same the wiry threads to weave,
We know not why or what, yet weave, forever weave.