A short poem by
Walt Whitman, from his
Leaves of Grass. It was written in the
civil war era, yet might speak about America at war today...
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Long, too long America,
Traveling roads all even and peaceful you learn'd from joys
and prosperity only,
But now, ah now, to learn from crises of anguish, advancing,
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?)