To Rich Givers

Walt Whitman

   WHAT you give me, I cheerfully accept,
   A little sustenance, a hut and garden, a little money--these, as I
         rendezvous with my poems;
   A traveler's lodging and breakfast as I journey through The States--
         Why should I be ashamed to own such gifts? Why to advertise for
         them?
   For I myself am not one who bestows nothing upon man and woman;
   For I bestow upon any man or woman the entrance to all the gifts of
         the universe.

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