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by Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892)

Continuities
Language: English 
Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost,
No birth, identity, form—no object of the world.
Nor life, nor force, nor any visible thing;
Appearance must not foil, nor shifted sphere confuse thy brain.
Ample are time and space—ample the fields of Nature.
The body, sluggish, aged, cold—the embers left from earlier  
 fires,
The light in the eye grown dim, shall duly flame again;
The sun now low in the west rises for mornings and for noons  
 continual;
To frozen clods ever the spring's invisible law returns,
With grass and flowers and summer fruits and corn.

Confirmed with Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, Philadelphia: David McKay, 1891–1892, p.396


Text Authorship:

  • by Walt Whitman (1819 - 1892), "Continuities", subtitle: "From a talk I had lately with a German spiritualist", appears in Leaves of Grass [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

  • by Benton Brittney (b. 1999), "Continuities", 2020 [ satb chorus, violoncello and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

Researcher for this page: Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

This text was added to the website: 2025-09-24
Line count: 12
Word count: 97

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