“Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are million of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,
You shall not look through my eye either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.”
While reading this part of the poem, I felt like he was talking to me directly. Since day one of my life, I cannot remember when I’ve followed a direct order(another reason why I’m not in the military). I’ve always question things, The Bible, The Holy Qur’an, my parents, and my teachers. I’ve always made my own decisions.
I’m a Muslim. And I have a very close friend who is a Christian. The different between me and him is not only our religion, we look at life differently. Though my religion wants me to “believe” without quetioning, I still felt like there are some questions that needed to be answered. For instance, Why do I need a religion if I strongly believe in God?
Going back to what Withman was saying, that we should “filter them from ourselves” is exactly what I’ve been doing since I know myself.
2 Comments
Beautiful lines. Will you add your own comment about them?
“Why do I need a religion if I strongly believe in God?” That’s such a key question. Maybe you had already thought about it before running into Whitman, but I think it’s pretty great that his explorations run so parallel to yours.
Is there a message in the fact that the photo is of the back of your head? It’s intriguing but distancing.