Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman

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THAT music always round me, unceasing, unbeginning, yet long
untaught I did not hear,

But now the chorus I hear and am elated,

A tenor, strong, ascending with power and health, with glad notes
of daybreak I hear,

A soprano at intervals sailing buoyantly over the tops of immense
waves,

A transparent base shuddering lusciously under and through the
universe,

The triumphant tutti, the funeral wailings with sweet flutes and
violins, all these I fill myself with,

I hear not the volumes of sound merely, I am moved by the
exquisite meanings,

I listen to the different voices winding in and out, striving, contend-
ing with fiery vehemence to excel each other in emotion;

I do not think the performers know themselves—but now I think
I begin to know them.

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