{
 "id": "walt-whitman/crossing-brooklyn-ferry",
 "title": "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry",
 "poet": "Walt Whitman",
 "poet_slug": "walt-whitman",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Leaves of Grass",
 "book_slug": "leaves-of-grass",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 84,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1856,
  "venue": "Leaves of Grass (1856), as “Sun-Down Poem”",
  "note": "Retitled “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” in 1860. This text follows the 1891–92 “deathbed” edition of Leaves of Grass.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossing_Brooklyn_Ferry"
  ]
 },
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  "repo": "standardebooks/walt-whitman_leaves-of-grass",
  "file": "crossing-brooklyn-ferry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1322",
   "https://archive.org/details/leavesgrass03whitgoog"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 132,
  "n_stanzas": 17,
  "n_parts": 9,
  "longest_line_chars": 138,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Flood-tide below me! I see you face to face!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Clouds of the west⁠—sun there half an hour high⁠—I see you also face to face.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Crowds of men and women attired in the usual costumes, how curious you are to me!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On the ferry-boats the hundreds and hundreds that cross, returning home, are more curious to me than you suppose,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And you that shall cross from shore to shore years hence are more to me, and more in my meditations, than you might suppose.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The impalpable sustenance of me from all things at all hours of the day,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The simple, compact, well-join’d scheme, myself disintegrated, every one disintegrated yet part of the scheme,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The similitudes of the past and those of the future,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The glories strung like beads on my smallest sights and hearings, on the walk in the street and the passage over the river,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The current rushing so swiftly and swimming with me far away,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The others that are to follow me, the ties between me and them,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The certainty of others, the life, love, sight, hearing of others.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Others will enter the gates of the ferry and cross from shore to shore,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Others will watch the run of the flood-tide,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Others will see the shipping of Manhattan north and west, and the heights of Brooklyn to the south and east,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Others will see the islands large and small;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fifty years hence, others will see them as they cross, the sun half an hour high,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A hundred years hence, or ever so many hundred years hence, others will see them,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will enjoy the sunset, the pouring-in of the flood-tide, the falling-back to the sea of the ebb-tide.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "It avails not, time nor place⁠—distance avails not,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I am with you, you men and women of a generation, or ever so many generations hence,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just as you feel when you look on the river and sky, so I felt,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just as any of you is one of a living crowd, I was one of a crowd,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just as you are refresh’d by the gladness of the river and the bright flow, I was refresh’d,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just as you stand and lean on the rail, yet hurry with the swift current, I stood yet was hurried,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just as you look on the numberless masts of ships and the thick-stemm’d pipes of steamboats, I look’d.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I too many and many a time cross’d the river of old,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Watched the Twelfth-month sea-gulls, saw them high in the air floating with motionless wings, oscillating their bodies,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw how the glistening yellow lit up parts of their bodies and left the rest in strong shadow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw the slow-wheeling circles and the gradual edging toward the south,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw the reflection of the summer sky in the water,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had my eyes dazzled by the shimmering track of beams,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Look’d at the fine centrifugal spokes of light round the shape of my head in the sunlit water,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Look’d on the haze on the hills southward and south-westward,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Look’d on the vapor as it flew in fleeces tinged with violet,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Look’d toward the lower bay to notice the vessels arriving,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw their approach, saw aboard those that were near me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw the white sails of schooners and sloops, saw the ships at anchor,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sailors at work in the rigging or out astride the spars,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The round masts, the swinging motion of the hulls, the slender serpentine pennants,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The large and small steamers in motion, the pilots in their pilot-houses,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The white wake left by the passage, the quick tremulous whirl of the wheels,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The flags of all nations, the falling of them at sunset,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The scallop-edged waves in the twilight, the ladled cups, the frolicsome crests and glistening,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The stretch afar growing dimmer and dimmer, the gray walls of the granite storehouses by the docks,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On the river the shadowy group, the big steam-tug closely flank’d on each side by the barges, the hay-boat, the belated lighter,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On the neighboring shore the fires from the foundry chimneys burning high and glaringly into the night,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Casting their flicker of black contrasted with wild red and yellow light over the tops of houses, and down into the clefts of streets.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "These and all else were to me the same as they are to you,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I loved well those cities, loved well the stately and rapid river,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The men and women I saw were all near to me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Others the same⁠—others who look back on me because I look’d forward to them,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(The time will come, though I stop here to-day and to-night.)",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What is it then between us?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What is the count of the scores or hundreds of years between us?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Whatever it is, it avails not⁠—distance avails not, and place avails not,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I too lived, Brooklyn of ample hills was mine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I too walk’d the streets of Manhattan island, and bathed in the waters around it,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I too felt the curious abrupt questionings stir within me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the day among crowds of people sometimes they came upon me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In my walks home late at night or as I lay in my bed they came upon me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I too had been struck from the float forever held in solution,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I too had receiv’d identity by my body,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That I was I knew was of my body, and what I should be I knew I should be of my body.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "It is not upon you alone the dark patches fall,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The dark threw its patches down upon me also,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The best I had done seem’d to me blank and suspicious,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My great thoughts as I supposed them, were they not in reality meagre?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor is it you alone who know what it is to be evil,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I am he who knew what it was to be evil,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I too knitted the old knot of contrariety,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blabb’d, blush’d, resented, lied, stole, grudg’d,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Had guile, anger, lust, hot wishes I dared not speak,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was wayward, vain, greedy, shallow, sly, cowardly, malignant,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The wolf, the snake, the hog, not wanting in me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The cheating look, the frivolous word, the adulterous wish, not wanting,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Refusals, hates, postponements, meanness, laziness, none of these wanting,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was one with the rest, the days and haps of the rest,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was call’d by my nighest name by clear loud voices of young men as they saw me approaching or passing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Felt their arms on my neck as I stood, or the negligent leaning of their flesh against me as I sat,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Saw many I loved in the street or ferry-boat or public assembly, yet never told them a word,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Lived the same life with the rest, the same old laughing, gnawing, sleeping,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Play’d the part that still looks back on the actor or actress,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The same old role, the role that is what we make it, as great as we like,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or as small as we like, or both great and small.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Closer yet I approach you,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What thought you have of me now, I had as much of you⁠—I laid in my stores in advance,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I consider’d long and seriously of you before you were born.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Who was to know what should come home to me?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who knows but I am enjoying this?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who knows, for all the distance, but I am as good as looking at you now, for all you cannot see me?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Ah, what can ever be more stately and admirable to me than mast-hemm’d Manhattan?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "River and sunset and scallop-edg’d waves of flood-tide?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sea-gulls oscillating their bodies, the hay-boat in the twilight, and the belated lighter?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What gods can exceed these that clasp me by the hand, and with voices I love call me promptly and loudly by my nighest name as I approach?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What is more subtle than this which ties me to the woman or man that looks in my face?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Which fuses me into you now, and pours my meaning into you?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We understand then do we not?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What I promis’d without mentioning it, have you not accepted?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What the study could not teach⁠—what the preaching could not accomplish is accomplish’d, is it not?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Flow on, river! flow with the flood-tide, and ebb with the ebb-tide!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Frolic on, crested and scallop-edg’d waves!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Gorgeous clouds of the sunset! drench with your splendor me, or the men and women generations after me!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cross from shore to shore, countless crowds of passengers!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stand up, tall masts of Mannahatta! stand up, beautiful hills of Brooklyn!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Throb, baffled and curious brain! throw out questions and answers!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Suspend here and everywhere, eternal float of solution!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Gaze, loving and thirsting eyes, in the house or street or public assembly!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sound out, voices of young men! loudly and musically call me by my nighest name!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Live, old life! play the part that looks back on the actor or actress!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Play the old role, the role that is great or small according as one makes it!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Consider, you who peruse me, whether I may not in unknown ways be looking upon you;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Be firm, rail over the river, to support those who lean idly, yet haste with the hasting current;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fly on, sea-birds! fly sideways, or wheel in large circles high in the air;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Receive the summer sky, you water, and faithfully hold it till all downcast eyes have time to take it from you!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Diverge, fine spokes of light, from the shape of my head, or any one’s head, in the sunlit water!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Come on, ships from the lower bay! pass up or down, white-sail’d schooners, sloops, lighters!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Flaunt away, flags of all nations! be duly lower’d at sunset!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Burn high your fires, foundry chimneys! cast black shadows at nightfall! cast red and yellow light over the tops of the houses!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Appearances, now or henceforth, indicate what you are,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You necessary film, continue to envelop the soul,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "About my body for me, and your body for you, be hung our divinest aromas,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thrive, cities⁠—bring your freight, bring your shows, ample and sufficient rivers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Expand, being than which none else is perhaps more spiritual,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Keep your places, objects than which none else is more lasting.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You have waited, you always wait, you dumb, beautiful ministers,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We receive you with free sense at last, and are insatiate henceforward,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not you any more shall be able to foil us, or withhold yourselves from us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We use you, and do not cast you aside⁠—we plant you permanently within us,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We fathom you not⁠—we love you⁠—there is perfection in you also,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You furnish your parts toward eternity,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Great or small, you furnish your parts toward the soul.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}