Title: Hands Round
Creator: Walt Whitman
Date: Between 1865 and 1881
Whitman Archive ID: duk.00024
Source: Trent Collection of Whitmaniana, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University. Transcribed from digital images of the original. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of manuscripts, see our statement of editorial policy.
Editorial note: This poem was never published in Whitman's lifetime, though he worked on it through several different draft forms. Sculley Bradley and Harold Blodgett believe (with a certainty they don't explain) that it was composed in 1876 in celebration of the United States centennial. See Leaves of Grass, Comprehensive Reader's Edition (New York: New York University Press, 1965), 673. Another possibility is that the poem was composed when Whitman was drafting the cluster "Marches now the War is Over" in 1871.
Contributors to digital file: Nicole Gray, Andrew Jewell, Kenneth M. Price, Brett Barney, Nick Krauter, Stacey Provan, and Zach Bajaber
[illegible]and
Starry [Uni?]on Hands Ro[und]
[See!?] see! see! where the sun is beaming!
See! see! all see! how all the ^bright stars, they are a- gleaming! ? all the stars a-gleaming!
? O See by day [how the sun is beaming]
What the word charm of power unbroken?
O what ? Columbia's
What the Charm word spell of heavens own ly God's ceaseless [illegible]n token?
Union all! O its Union all! ? O its hand in hand, & a Union of all
O its all for
in each & its each for in allWhat Columbia's ? mystic [illegible] friendliest token‑
'Tils the hands we take for the Union of all
Herse's mine—give me thine—for the Union of all
What Columbia's friendliest token?
'Tis the hands we take All hands round for the Union all!
Here's mine—give me thine—for the Union all
Stars of the sky up above in eternal lustre
Stars of the earth States in a compact clustre
Clasping, holding, earthward, heavenward
Onward, on,
Circling, circling, moving roundward & onward
As our hands we grasp All hands round for the Union all
Here's mine—give me thine—for the Union all
Red, white, blue [to?] in [illegible] eastward [illegible], western westward
Red, white, blue, to the sou northern , southern with the breezes waving
All including, combining, folding, loving,
E Northward, Southward, Westward moving
O its all hands round for the
Union all! O its Union all
Here's mine—give me thine—for the Union all
O its all ^
for each—and each for alEver O orbs, be it Hand in hand linking clasping, holding, ^clasping, circling earthward, or heavenward!
Onward! onward! onward! onward!
Stars of for the sky in their eternal the eternal an refulgent eternal lustre
Stars of for here the world ^earth in the an endless a in a compact cluster
Of Union all Then our hands here we give for the Union all!
O its all for each hand round—and each for all!
Ever orbs in
Ever O Orbs of to be it [illegible] [earthward?] a[illegible]