Quote of the Day for Friday, October 16, 2026

A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he.

Walt Whitman, Song of Myself, 1855

Our note: From "Song of Myself."

Verified in the full text of Song of Myself on Project Gutenberg · Project Gutenberg ebook #1322 · Collected in Leaves of Grass

Painted the same decade: Madame Frederic Breyer (Fanny Hélène Van Bruyssel, 1830–1894), Gustave Courbet, 1858

More quotes about: curiosity, humility

Every quote on ponderloop is by a writer who died in 1955 or earlier, from a work published in 1930 or earlier, and was found word for word in the linked edition. How we verify.