I sit and look out upon all the sorrows of the world, and upon all

oppression and shame;

I hear secret convulsive sobs from young men, at anguish withthemselves, remorseful after deeds done;

I see, in low life, the mother misused by her children, dying,neglected, gaunt, desperate;

I see the wife misused by her husband--I see the treacherous seducer of young women;

I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love, attempted to behid--

I see these sights on the earth;

I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny--

I see martyrs andprisoners;

I observe a famine at sea--

I observe the sailors casting lots whos hall be kill'd, to preserve the lives of the rest;

I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon laborers, the poor, and upon negroes, and the like;

All these--All the meanness and agony without end, I sitting, lookout upon,

See, hear, and am silent.

By Walt Whitman