First published in the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass, this poem is an exploration of sexual love as agape.
Allen Ginsberg was especially moved by this poem, as he took it to being a vieled exploration of Whitman's homosexuality (no one is really sure what Whitman's orientation was - we presume bisexual). He analyses specifically the stanza beginning "The cloth laps a first sweet eating and drinking" as referring to fellatio, which was "not done" (or, not admitted to) by properly married women, and had the stigma of being an exclusively homosexual act (bizarre as that may seem today, buggery retains much the same stigma).
Whether his interpretation is correct or not, there are other portions of the poem that are undeniably homosexual, particularly "He whom I call answers me and takes the place of my lover..." Whitman was one of the first poets to openly develop a homosexual aesthetic; before, poets were forced to take great pains to disguise their homosexuality, often resorting to elaborate metaphorical conceits. Poets like Whitman forged the paths that allowed Ginsberg's generation to be open about their sexualities (although, even Ginsberg's Howl was banned under obscenity laws in the McCarthy era).
Of course, there is much more to this poem than sexual politics. The symbolic structure is complex, and we see Whitman pioneering the Romantic-inspired style that was to become the foundation of the "authentic American voice".
The Sleepers
I wander all night in my vision,
Stepping with light feet . . . . swiftly and noiselessly
stepping and stopping,
Bending with open eyes over the shut eyes of sleepers;
Wandering and confused . . . . lost to myself . . . .
ill-assorted . . . . contradictory,
Pausing and gazing and bending and stopping.
How solemn they look there, stretched and still;
How quiet they breathe, the little children in their cradles.
The wretched features of ennuyees, the white features of
corpses, the livid faces of drunkards, the sick-gray faces
of onanists,
The gashed bodies on battlefields, the insane in their strong-doored
rooms, the sacred idiots,
The newborn emerging from gates and the dying emerging
from gates,
The night pervades them and enfolds them.
The married couple sleep calmly in their bed, he with his
palm on the hip of the wife, and she with her palm on
the hip of the husband,
The sisters sleep lovingly side by side in their bed,
The men sleep lovingly side by side in theirs,
And the mother sleeps with her little child carefully
wrapped.
The blind sleep, and the deaf and dumb sleep,
The prisoner sleeps well in the prison . . . . the runaway
son sleeps,
The murderer that is to be hung next day . . . . how does
he sleep?
And the murdered person . . . . how does he sleep?
The female that loves unrequited sleeps,
And the male that loves unrequited sleeps;
The head of the moneymaker that plotted all day sleeps,
And the enraged and treacherous dispositions sleep.
I stand with drooping eyes by the worstsuffering and
restless,
I pass my hands soothingly to and fro a few inches from them;
The restless sink in their beds . . . . they fitfully sleep.
The earth recedes from me into the night,
I saw that it was beautiful . . . . and I see that what is not
the earth is beautiful.
I go from bedside to bedside . . . . I sleep close with the
other sleepers, each in turn;
I dream in my dream all the dreams of the other dreamers,
And I become the other dreamers.
I am a dance . . . . Play up there! the fit is whirling me fast.
I am the everlaughing . . . . it is new moon and twilight,
I see the hiding of douceurs . . . . I see nimble ghosts
whichever way I look,
Cache and cache again deep in the ground and sea, and
where it is neither ground or sea.
Well do they do their jobs, those journeymen divine,
Only from me can they hide nothing and would not if they
could;
I reckon I am their boss, and they make me a pet besides,
And surround me, and lead me and run ahead when I walk,
And lift their cunning covers and signify me with stretched
arms, and resume the way;
Onward we move, a gay gang of blackguards with
mirthshouting music and wildflapping pennants of joy.
I am the actor and the actress . . . . the voter . . the
politician,
The emigrant and the exile . . the criminal that stood in the
box,
He who has been famous, and he who shall be famous after
today,
The stammerer . . . . the wellformed person . . the wasted
or feeble person.
I am she who adorned herself and folded her hair expectantly,
My truant lover has come and it is dark.
Double yourself and receive me darkness,
Receive me and my lover too . . . . he will not let me go
without him.
I roll myself upon you as upon a bed . . . . I resign myself
to the dusk.
He whom I call answers me and takes the place of my lover,
He rises with me silently from the bed.
Darkness you are gentler than my lover . . . . his flesh was
sweaty and panting,
I feel the hot moisture yet that he left me.
My hands are spread forth . . I pass them in all directions,
I would sound up the shadowy shore to which you are
journeying.
Be careful, darkness . . . . already, what was it touched me?
I thought my lover had gone . . . . else darkness and he
are one,
I hear the heart-beat . . . . I follow . . I fade away.
O hotcheeked and blushing! O foolish hectic!
O for pity's sake, no one must see me now! . . . . my
clothes were stolen while I was abed,
Now I am thrust forth, where shall I run?
Pier that I saw dimly last night when I looked from the
windows,
Pier out from the main, let me catch myself with you and
stay . . . . I will not chafe you;
I feel ashamed to go naked about the world,
And am curious to know where my feet stand . . . . and
what is this flooding me, childhood or manhood . . . .
and the hunger that crosses the bridge between.
The cloth laps a first sweet eating and drinking,
Laps life-swelling yolks . . . . laps ear of rose-corn, milky
and just ripened:
The white teeth stay, and the boss-tooth advances in darkness,
And liquor is spilled on lips and bosoms by touching glasses,
and the best liquor afterward.
I descend my western course . . . . my sinews are flaccid,
Perfume and youth course through me, and I am their wake.
It is my face yellow and wrinkled instead of the old woman's,
I sit low in a strawbottom chair and carefully darn my
grandson's stockings.
It is I too . . . . the sleepless widow looking out on the
winter midnight,
I see the sparkles of starshine on the icy and pallid earth.
A shroud I see -- and I am the shroud . . . . I wrap a body
and lie in the coffin;
It is dark here underground . . . . it is not evil or pain here
. . . . it is blank here, for reasons.
It seems to me that everything in the light and air ought to
be happy;
Whoever is not in his coffin and the dark grave, let him
know he has enough.
I see a beautiful gigantic swimmer swimming naked through
the eddies of the sea,
His brown hair lies close and even to his head . . . . he
strikes out with courageous arms . . . . he urges
himself with his legs.
I see his white body . . . . I see his undaunted eyes;
I hate the swift-running eddies that would dash him
headforemost on the rocks.
What are you doing you ruffianly red-trickled waves?
Will you kill the courageous giant? Will you kill him in the
prime of his middle age?
Steady and long he struggles;
He is baffled and banged and bruised . . . . he holds out
while his strength holds out,
The slapping eddies are spotted with his blood . . . . they
bear him away . . . . they roll him and swing him and
turn him:
His beautiful body is borne in the circling eddies . . . . it is
continually bruised on rocks,
Swiftly and out of sight is borne the brave corpse.
I turn but do not extricate myself;
Confused . . . . a pastreading . . . . another, but with
darkness yet.
The beach is cut by the razory ice-wind . . . . the wreck-guns
sound,
The tempest lulls and the moon comes floundering through
the drifts.
I look where the ship helplessly heads end on . . . . I hear
the burst as she strikes . . I hear the howls of dismay
. . . . they grow fainter and fainter.
I cannot aid with my wringing fingers;
I can but rush to the surf and let it drench me and freeze
upon me.
I search with the crowd . . . . not one of the company is
washed to us alive;
In the morning I help pick up the dead and lay them in
rows in a barn.
Now of the old war-days . . the defeat at Brooklyn;
Washington stands inside the lines . . he stands on the
entrenched hills amid a crowd of officers,
His face is cold and damp . . . . he cannot repress the
weeping drops . . . . he lifts the glass perpetually to
his eyes . . . . the color is blanched from his cheeks,
He sees the slaughter of the southern braves confided to him
by their parents.
The same at last and at last when peace is declared,
He stands in the room of the old tavern . . . . the
wellbeloved soldiers all pass through,
The officers speechless and slow draw near in their turns,
The chief encircles their necks with his arm and kisses them
on the cheek,
He kisses lightly the wet cheeks one after another . . . . he
shakes hands and bids goodbye to the army.
Now I tell what my mother told me today as we sat at
dinner together,
Of when she was a nearly grown girl living home with her
parents on the old homestead.
A red squaw came one breakfasttime to the old homestead,
On her back she carried a bundle of rushes for
rushbottoming chairs;
Her hair straight shiny coarse black and profuse
halfenveloped her face,
Her step was free and elastic . . . . her voice sounded
exquisitely as she spoke.
My mother looked in delight and amazement at the stranger,
She looked at the beauty of her tallborne face and full and
pliant limbs,
The more she looked upon her she loved her,
Never before had she seen such wonderful beauty and purity;
She made her sit on a bench by the jamb of the fireplace . . . .
she cooked food for her,
She had no work to give her but she gave her remembrance
and fondness.
The red squaw staid all the forenoon, and toward the middle
of the afternoon she went away;
O my mother was loth to have her go away,
All the week she thought of her . . . . she watched for her
many a month,
She remembered her many a winter and many a summer,
But the red squaw never came nor was heard of there again.
Now Lucifer was not dead . . . . or if he was I am his
sorrowful terrible heir;
I have been wronged . . . . I am oppressed . . . . I hate
him that oppresses me,
I will either destroy him, or he shall release me.
Damn him! how he does defile me,
How he informs against my brother and sister and takes pay
for their blood,
How he laughs when I look down the bend after the
steamboat that carries away my woman.
Now the vast dusk bulk that is the whale's bulk . . . . it
seems mine,
Warily, sportsman! though I lie so sleepy and sluggish, my
tap is death.
A show of the summer softness . . . . a contact of something
unseen . . . . an amour of the light and air;
I am jealous and overwhelmed with friendliness,
And will go gallivant with the light and the air myself,
And have an unseen something to be in contact with them
also.
O love and summer! you are in the dreams and in me,
Autumn and winter are in the dreams . . . . the farmer
goes with his thrift,
The droves and crops increase . . . . the barns are wellfilled.
Elements merge in the night . . . . ships make tacks in the
dreams . . . . the sailor sails . . . . the exile returns
home,
The fugitive returns unharmed . . . . the immigrant is back
beyond months and years;
The poor Irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood,
with the wellknown neighbors and faces,
They warmly welcome him . . . . he is barefoot again . . . .
he forgets he is welloff;
The Dutchman voyages home, and the Scotchman and
Welchman voyage home . . and the native of the
Mediterranean voyages home;
To every port of England and France and Spain enter
wellfilled ships;
The Swiss foots it toward his hills . . . . the Prussian goes
his way, and the Hungarian his way, and the Pole goes
his way,
The Swede returns, and the Dane and Norwegian return.
The homeward bound and the outward bound,
The beautiful lost swimmer, the ennuyee, the onanist, the
female that loves unrequited, the moneymaker,
The actor and actress . . those through with their parts and
those waiting to commence,
The affectionate boy, the husband and wife, the voter, the
nominee that is chosen and the nominee that has failed,
The great already known, and the great anytime after to day,
The stammerer, the sick, the perfectformed, the homely,
The criminal that stood in the box, the judge that sat and
sentenced him, the fluent lawyers, the jury, the
audience,
The laugher and weeper, the dancer, the midnight widow,
the red squaw,
The consumptive, the erysipalite, the idiot, he that is
wronged,
The antipodes, and every one between this and them in the
dark,
I swear they are averaged now . . . . one is no better than
the other,
The night and sleep have likened them and restored them.
I swear they are all beautiful,
Every one that sleeps is beautiful . . . . every thing in the
dim night is beautiful,
The wildest and bloodiest is over and all is peace.
Peace is always beautiful,
The myth of heaven indicates peace and night.
The myth of heaven indicates the soul;
The soul is always beautiful . . . . it appears more or it
appears less . . . . it comes or lags behind,
It comes from its embowered garden and looks pleasantly on
itself and encloses the world;
Perfect and clean the genitals previously jetting, and perfect
and clean the womb cohering,
The head wellgrown and proportioned and plumb, and the
bowels and joints proportioned and plumb.
The soul is always beautiful,
The universe is duly in order . . . . every thing is in its place,
What is arrived is in its place, and what waits is in its place;
The twisted skull waits . . . . the watery or rotten blood
waits,
The child of the glutton or venerealee waits long, and the
child of the drunkard waits long, and the drunkard
himself waits long,
The sleepers that lived and died wait . . . . the far advanced
are to go on in their turns, and the far behind are to go
on in their turns,
The diverse shall be no less diverse, but they shall flow and
unite . . . . they unite now.
The sleepers are very beautiful as they lie unclothed,
They flow hand in hand over the whole earth from east to
west as they lie unclothed;
The Asiatic and African are hand in hand . . . . the
European and American are hand in hand,
Learned and unlearned are hand in hand . . and male and
female are hand in hand;
The bare arm of the girl crosses the bare breast of her lover
. . . . they press close without lust . . . .
his lips press her neck,
The father holds his grown or ungrown son in his arms with
measureless love . . . . and the son holds the father in
his arms with measureless love,
The white hair of the mother shines on the white wrist of
the daughter,
The breath of the boy goes with the breath of the man . . . .
friend is inarmed by friend,
The scholar kisses the teacher and the teacher kisses the
scholar . . . . the wronged is made right,
The call of the slave is one with the master's call . . and the
master salutes the slave,
The felon steps forth from the prison . . . . the insane
becomes sane . . . . the suffering of sick persons is
relieved,
The sweatings and fevers stop . . the throat that was
unsound is sound . . the lungs of the consumptive are
resumed . . the poor distressed head is free,
The joints of the rheumatic move as smoothly as ever, and
smoother than ever,
Stiflings and passages open . . . . the paralysed become
supple,
The swelled and convulsed and congested awake to themselves
in condition,
They pass the invigoration of the night and the chemistry of
the night and awake.
I too pass from the night;
I stay awhile away O night, but I return to you again and
love you;
Why should I be afraid to trust myself to you?
I am not afraid . . . . I have been well brought forward
by you;
I love the rich running day, but I do not desert her in whom
I lay so long;
I know not how I came of you, and I know not where I go
with you . . . . but I know I came well and shall go well.
I will stop only a time with the night . . . . and rise betimes.
I will duly pass the day O my mother and duly return to you;
Not you will yield forth the dawn again more surely than
you will yield forth me again,
Not the womb yields the babe in its time more surely than I
shall be yielded from you in my time.
