This is what you shall do: Love the
earth and sun and the animals,
despise riches, give alms to
everyone that asks, stand up for the
stupid and crazy, devote your income
and labor to others, hate tyrants,
argue not concerning God, have
patience and indulgence toward
people, take off your hat to nothing
known or unknown or to any man or
number of men, go freely with
powerful uneducated persons and with
the young and with the mothers of
families, read these leaves in the
open air every season of every year
of your life, re-examine all you
have been told at school or church
or in any book, dismiss whatever
insults your own soul, and your very
flesh shall be a great poem and have
the richest fluency not only in its
words but in the silent lines of its
lips and face and between the lashes
of your eyes and in every motion and
joint of your body.
--Walt Whitman
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