122.I am he attesting sympathy,
Shall I make my list of things in the house, and skip
the house that supports them?
123.I am the poet of common sense, and of the
demonstrable, and of immortality,
And am not the poet of goodness only—I do not
decline to be the poet of wickedness also.
124.Washes and razors for foofoos—for me freckles and
a bristling beard.
125.What blurt is this about virtue and about vice?
Evil propels me, and reform of evil propels me—I
stand indifferent,
My gait is no fault-finder's or rejecter's gait,
I moisten the roots of all that has grown.
126.Did you fear some scrofula out of the unflagging
pregnancy?
Did you guess the celestial laws are yet to be worked
over and rectified?
127.I step up to say that what we do is right, and what
we affirm is right—and some is only the ore of
right,
Witnesses of us—one side a balance, and the
antipodal side a balance,
Soft doctrine as steady help as stable doctrine,
Thoughts and deeds of the present, our rouse and
early start.
128.This minute that comes to me over the past decillions,
There is no better than it and now.
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Leaves of Grass.
