- WHY, who makes much of a miracle?
- As to me, I know of nothing else but miracles,
- Whether I walk the streets of Manhattan,
- Or dart my sight over the roofs of houses toward the sky,
- Or wade with naked feet along the beach just in the edge of the water,
- Or stand under trees in the woods,
- Or talk by day with anyone I love, or sleep in the bed at night with anyone I love,
- Or sit at table at dinner with the rest,
- Or look at strangers opposite me riding in the car,
- Or watch honey bees busy around the hive of a summer forenoon,
- Or animals feeding in the fields,
- Or birds, or the wonderfulness of insects in the air,
- Or the wonderfulness of the sundown, or of stars shining so quiet and bright,
- Or the exquisite delicate thin curve of the new moon in spring;
- These with the rest, one and all, are to me miracles,
- The whole referring, yet each distinct and in its place.
- To me every hour of the light and dark is a miracle,
- Every cubic inch of space is a miracle,
- Every square yard of the surface of the earth is spread with the same,
- Every foot of the interior swarms with the same.
- To me the sea is a continual miracle,
- The fishes that swim--the rocks--the motion of the waves--the ships with the men in them,
- What stranger miracles are there?
Walt Whitman (1856)
