Poem: “City of Ships” by Walt Whitman

Poems Of War

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American Literature – Children Books – American Poetry – Walt Whitman – Poems by Walt Whitman – Poems Of War
< < < Beat! Beat! Drums!
A March in the Ranks Hard-Prest, and the Road Unknown > > >

City of Ships

City of ships!
(O the black ships! O the fierce ships!
O the beautiful sharp-bow’d steam-ships and sail-ships!)
City of the world! (for all races are here,
All the lands of the earth make contributions here);
City of the sea! city of hurried and glittering tides!
City whose gleeful tides continually rush or recede, whirling in and out with eddies and foam!
City of wharves and stores—city of tall façades of marble and iron!
Proud and passionate city—mettlesome, mad, extravagant city!
Spring up O city—not for peace alone, but be indeed yourself, warlike!
Fear not—submit to no models but your own, O city!
Behold me—incarnate me as I have incarnated you!

I have rejected nothing you offer’d me—whom you adopted I have adopted,
Good or bad I never question you—I love all—I do not condemn anything,
I chant and celebrate all that is yours—yet peace no more,
In peace I chanted peace, but now the drum of war is mine,
War, red war is my song through your streets, O city!

< < < Beat! Beat! Drums!
A March in the Ranks Hard-Prest, and the Road Unknown > > >

American Literature – Children Books – American Poetry – Walt Whitman – Poems by Walt Whitman – Poems Of War

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Poems Of War

City of Ships

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