brtom-poem

I tramp a perpetual journey, My signs are a rain-proof coat and good shoes and a staff cut from the woods; No friend of mine takes his ease in my chair, I have no chair, nor church nor philosophy; I lead no man to a dinner-table or library or exchange, But each man and each woman of you I lead upon a knoll, My left hand hooks you round the waist, My right hand points to landscapes of continents, and a plain public road.

Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you, You must travel it for yourself.

(from "Song of Myself " by Walt Whitman in Leaves of Grass)