stumbled upon in Stuart Sovatsky’s “Eros, Consciousness, and Kundalini”:
Whoever you are holding me now in hand, Without one thing all will be useless, I give you fair warning before you attempt me further, I am not what you supposed, but far different. Who is he that would become my follower? Who would sign himself a candidate for my affections? The way is suspicious, the result uncertain, perhaps destructive, You would have to give up all else, I alone would expect to be your sole and exclusive standard, Your novitiate would even then be long and exhausting, The whole past theory of your life and all conformity to the lives around you would have to be abandon'd ... Even while you should think you had unquestionably caught me, behold! Already you see I have escaped from you. ... –Walt Whitman, from "Whoever You are, Holding Me now in Hand"