Long, Too Long, O Land

by Walt Whitman · 1871
Published 01/07/1871

LONG, too long, O land,

Traveling roads all even and peaceful, you learn'd from joys and prosperity only;

But now, ah now, to learn from crises of anguish—ad-vancingadvancing, grappling with direst fate, and recoiling not;

And now to conceive, and show to the world, what your children en-masse really are;

(For who except myself has yet conceiv'd what your children en-masse really are?)

#collective identity #existential angst #generational responsibility #walt whitman

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