Who Is Now Reading This?

Walt Whitman

   May-be one is now reading this who knows some wrong-doing of my past
         life,
   Or may-be a stranger is reading this who has secretly loved me,
   Or may-be one who meets all my grand assumptions and egotisms with
         derision,
   Or may-be one who is puzzled at me.

   As if I were not puzzled at myself!
   Or as if I never deride myself! (O conscience-struck! O self-
         convicted!)
   Or as if I do not secretly love strangers! (O tenderly, a long time,
         and never avow it;)
   Or as if I did not see, perfectly well, interior in myself, the stuff
         of wrong-doing,
   Or as if it could cease transpiring from me until it must cease.   10

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