I SIT and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all <br /> oppression and shame; <br /> I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men, at anguish with <br /> themselves, remorseful after deeds done; <br /> I see, in low life, the mother misused by her children, dying, <br /> neglected, gaunt, desperate; <br /> I see the wife misused by her husband--I see the treacherous seducer <br /> of young women; <br /> I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love, attempted to be <br /> hid--I see these sights on the earth; <br /> I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny--I see martyrs and <br /> prisoners; <br /> I observe a famine at sea--I observe the sailors casting lots who <br /> shall be kill'd, to preserve the lives of the rest; <br /> I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon <br /> laborers, the poor, and upon negroes, and the like; <br /> All these--All the meanness and agony without end, I sitting, look <br /> out upon, <br /> See, hear, and am silent. 10<br /><br />Walt Whitman<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/i-sit-and-look-out/
