by Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892)
The Unknown Region See original
Language: English
Darest thou now O Soul,
Walk out with me toward the Unknown Region,
Where neither ground is for the feet
nor any path to follow?
No map there, nor guide,
Nor voice sounding, nor touch of human hand,
Nor face with blooming flesh,
nor lips, nor eyes, are in that land.
I know it not O Soul;
Nor dost thou -- all is a blank before us;
All waits, undream'd of, in that region,
the inaccessible land,
The unknown region..
...
Note: the indented lines have been broken off from the preceding lines so that parallel translations will be easier to see. This poem has five stanzas of three lines each.
Composition:
- Set to music by William Howard Schuman (1910 - 1992), "The Unknown Region", published 1959, stanzas 1-3 [ SATB chorus a cappella ], from Carols of Death, no. 2
Text Authorship:
- by Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892), "Darest thou now O Soul"
See other settings of this text.
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , copyright © 2014, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
- GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , copyright © 2018, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Researcher for this page: Ted Perry
This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 20
Word count: 128