And Thou America (Whitman, set by R. Valerio) (The Lied and Art Song Texts Page: Texts and Translations to Lieder, mélodies, canzoni, and other classical vocal music)


And thou, America!
For the Scheme's culmination -- its Thought, and its Reality,
For these, (not for thyself,) Thou hast arrived.
  
Thou too surroundest all;
Embracing, carrying, welcoming all, Thou too, by pathways broad and new,
To the Ideal tendest.
  
The measur'd faiths of other lands -- the grandeurs of the past,
Are not for Thee -- but grandeurs of Thine own;
Deific faiths and amplitudes, absorbing, comprehending all,
All eligible to all.
  
All, all for Immortality!
Love, like the light, silently wrapping all!
Nature's amelioration blessing all!
The blossoms, fruits of ages -- orchards divine and certain;
Forms, objects, growths, humanities, to spiritual Images ripening.

Authorship

Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

Song of the Universal

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive)

Raphael Valerio

Date added to the website: 2009-02-11.

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