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Home  »  Poems of Places An Anthology in 31 Volumes  »  The City of Ships

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
America: Vols. XXV–XXIX. 1876–79.

Middle States: New York, the City, N. Y.

The City of Ships

By Walt Whitman (1819–1892)

(See full text.)

CITY of ships!

(O the black ships! O the fierce ships!

O the beautiful, sharp-bowed steam-ships and sail-ships!)

City of the world! (for all races are here;

All the lands of the earth make contributions here;)

City of the sea! city of hurried and glittering tides!

City whose gleeful tides continually rush or recede, whirling in and out, with eddies and foam!

City of wharves and stores! city of tall façades of marble and iron!

Proud and passionate city! mettlesome, mad, extravagant city!

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