“When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer” — Walt Whitman

When I heard the learn’d astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams,
To sit yet awhile and ponder over the proofs,
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture‑room,
How soon, unaccountably, I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night‑air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.