Excerptsby Walt Whitman
(1819-1892)
1
I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.
6
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.
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more
than he.
stuff woven.
Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see
and remark, and say Whose?
Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the
vegetation.
Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
Growing among black folks as among white,
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I
receive them the same.
And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.
Tenderly will I use you curling grass,
It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men,
It may be if I had known them I would have loved them,
It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out
of their mothers' laps,
And here you are the mothers' laps.
This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers,
Darker than the colorless beards of old men,
Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.
O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues,
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for
nothing.
I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and
women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken
soon out of their laps.
What do you think has become of the young and old men?
And what do you think has become of the women and children?
They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the
end to arrest it,
And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.
All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.
| 52. The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me, he complains of my gab and my loitering. I too am not a bit tamed, I too am untranslatable, I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world. The last scud° of day holds back for me, It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadow’d wilds, It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk. I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun, I effuse° my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags. I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles. You will hardly know who I am or what I mean, But I shall be good health to you nevertheless, And filter and fiber your blood. Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged, Missing me one place search another, I stop somewhere waiting for you. |
(Note: For some reason the line breaks and spacing aren't formatting quite right on the blog. Sorry.)
Questions to Contemplate. Answer in comments if you are so inclined.
1. What, in your opinion, is the most important—or most interesting, or most puzzling—line in Whitman’s poem? Why? What do you think the line means?
2. Nature: How does Whitman show his connection to the natural world in this poem? For example, what qualities does he say he shares with the spotted hawk? How is or isn't his relationship to nature reminiscent of Cummings' connection to nature?
3. Style: What verb tense does Whitman use in this poem and other selections from “Song of Myself”? How would the effect have been different if the speaker had spoken in a different tense?
4. Self: The first line of “Song of Myself” is “I celebrate myself, and sing myself”; the last line is “I stop somewhere waiting for you.” What do you think this might reveal about Whitman’s purpose in writing “Song of Myself”? What is cummings' purpose? How does each man view himself within the context of the larger world? How do you know? How do they compare?
5: Art: What do you think Whitman means when he describes his own poetry as his “barbaric yawp”? How does this compare with cumming's views on poetry and art?
6. Politics: Some readers of this poem have further taken the meaning of “barbaric yawp” to refer to the way Europeans might have viewed the “American experiment” of democracy. What do you think? Does Whitman express political views? If so, how do they compare with cummings' political ideas?
7. If you have any questions of your own about this poem, please post them in the comments, so that others might attempt to answer them.
Posts
The line "A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
ReplyDeleteHow could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more
than he" really caught my attention because it reminded me of both cummings's views on nature and on the self. The "full hands" of the child, full of nature, represented through grass, seems to show the offerings that the world gives that people to not really understand but revel in nonetheless. But especially the last part seemed the most interesting to me, because this poem begins by saying that he celebrates himself, but here he continues to say that he doesn't really know so much about the world, and so in a way this poem is celebrating that kind of openness to knew things, and saying that it's good leave some things, like the grass, as a mystery.
-Anais
1. I really liked the lines "O I perceive after all so many uttering tounges,
ReplyDeleteAnd I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing." I'm not completely sure what it means...out of the context of the poem It seems like he's saying people were given toungues for a reason and should speak about things that matter more often.
2. He says he is untamed and sort of compares his poetry to how wild the hawk is. This is like cummings in that he seems respect the power of nature, but he gives more of a sense that he finds himself and his poetry equal to it. Cummings always seems to be a bit more respectful by implying that his poetry is still not as timeless and powerful as nature is.
3. Whitman speaks in first person, which unfortunately makes him seem a bit snobby. However, it makes the poem more personal because it seems like he is directly asking questions of the reader.
(I might come back and answer more later. However, on an unrelated note, the part of the poem where he wonders about what grass is really reminds me of the part or woman warrior where Kingston wonders what her aunts story was. Whitman uses a style similar to her talk-story in this poem.)
they are really hard to understand. I have read them more than 20 times... It is really tough. I guess I have to read again.
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