I appreciate all of the patience and understanding during this time. It means a lot to my family. Hope everyone has a wonderful break. See most of you in the W.O.M.B.

Defending Walt Whitman
By Sherman Alexie

Basketball is like this for young Indian boys, all arms and legs
and serious stomach muscles. Every body is brown!
These are the twentieth-century warriors who will never kill,
although a few sat quietly in the deserts of Kuwait,
waiting for orders to do something, to do something.

God, there is nothing as beautiful as a jumpshot
on a reservation summer basketball court
where the ball is moist with sweat,
and makes a sound when it swishes through the net
that causes Walt Whitman to weep because it is so perfect.

There are veterans of foreign wars here
although their bodies are still dominated
by collarbones and knees, although their bodies still respond
in the ways that bodies are supposed to respond when we are young.
Every body is brown! Look there, that boy can run
up and down this court forever. He can leap for a rebound
with his back arched like a salmon, all meat and bone
synchronized, magnetic, as if the court were a river,
as if the rim were a dam, as if the air were a ladder
leading the Indian boy toward home.

Some of the Indian boys still wear their military hair cuts
while a few have let their hair grow back.
It will never be the same as it was before!
One Indian boy has never cut his hair, not once, and he braids it
into wild patterns that do not measure anything.
He is just a boy with too much time on his hands.
Look at him. He wants to play this game in bare feet.

God, the sun is so bright! There is no place like this.
Walt Whitman stretches his calf muscles
on the sidelines. He has the next game.
His huge beard is ridiculous on the reservation.
Some body throws a crazy pass and Walt Whitman catches it
with quick hands. He brings the ball close to his nose
and breathes in all of its smells: leather, brown skin, sweat,
black hair, burning oil, twisted ankle, long drink of warm water,
gunpowder, pine tree. Walt Whitman squeezes the ball tightly.
He wants to run. He hardly has the patience to wait for his turn.
“What’s the score?” he asks. He asks, “What’s the score?”

Basketball is like this for Walt Whitman. He watches these Indian boys
as if they were the last bodies on earth. Every body is brown!
Walt Whitman shakes because he believes in God.
Walt Whitman dreams of the Indian boy who will defend him,
trapping him in the corner, all flailing arms and legs
and legendary stomach muscles. Walt Whitman shakes
because he believes in God. Walt Whitman dreams
of the first jumpshot he will take, the ball arcing clumsily
from his fingers, striking the rim so hard that it sparks.
Walt Whitman shakes because he believes in God.
Walt Whitman closes his eyes. He is a small man and his beard
is ludicrous on the reservation, absolutely insane.
His beard makes the Indian boys righteously laugh. His beard
frightens the smallest Indian boys. His beard tickles the skin
of the Indian boys who dribble past him. His beard, his beard!

God, there is beauty in every body. Walt Whitman stands
at center court while the Indian boys run from basket to basket.
Walt Whitman cannot tell the difference between
offense and defense. He does not care if he touches the ball.
Half of the Indian boys wear t-shirts damp with sweat
and the other half are bareback, skin slick and shiny.
There is no place like this. Walt Whitman smiles.
Walt Whitman shakes. This game belongs to him.

I found Whitman at Riverby Books in downtown Fredericksburg in front of the “Modern Warfare” section

As we draw toward the end of the semester, it becomes increasingly important to take a step back from the more particular tasks of uncovering discrepancies between versions of Leaves of Grass, analyzing speakers in various poems, placing Whitman in an historical context, etc. (which can all become consuming as Whitman has so much to offer in these areas) and instead turn our eyes toward Whitman’s legacy, his stamp on the world.  In doing so, it is amazing how much larger and completely consuming he becomes, which is a feat for a poet who already “contain[s] multitudes.”     

Throughout Andrew C. Higgins’s essay, “The Poet’s Reception and Legacy,” it is made clear that Whitman’s influence was and is everywhere, in every type of artist as well as in those outside of the art world.  Among his readers are those like Ginsberg who idolize and welcome him as a catalyst of change and an embracer of beauty, and there are those like T.S. Eliot who wish to extricate Whitman’s political self from his artistic self and deny his influence in the writing world.  Despite these polar opposite opinions, it is evident that Whitman’s effect, whatever it may be, did not go unnoticed.  He succeeded and succeeds today in reaching people across time and place even from the grave.  This can only be attributed to the fact that during his lifetime he refused to conform to the mandates of a dying country and he insisted with all of his might upon a true United States of America.    

In pouring over the modern and contemporary poetry we read for this week, I was completely awestruck, not because of the quality and power behind the poetry itself, (though undoubtedly that was part of it) but due to the realization that Whitman’s influence was and is in so many more places than I ever imagined.  It is striking to me that a man and poet I knew little of before this semester is in many ways the wellspring of some of my favorite writers – Ginsberg and Rich, for instance.  In the third part of Ginsberg’s Howl, he writes, “I’m with you in Rockland / where we hug and kiss the United States under / our bedsheets the United States that coughs all / night and won’t let us sleep” and I cannot think of another line in contemporary poetry where I see and feel Whitman more clearly. 

Throughout his life Whitman wrote of this “sick” America that suffered from a lack of unity and a lack of individual love and connection.  He fought against the American tendency to grow complacent or violent in the face of such an illness and desired above all else to live in a country that grows in and through each of its members.  Whitman’s America lives today in the hospitals with young men and women dying and fighting to live for it.  It celebrates the delicate intimacy between “comrades” whether male or female or black or white or rich or poor.  Whitman’s America recognizes the poverty and despair that plague it but will not stay silent, will not die out.  And Whitman’s America, my America, no matter the age, will not rest until it is truly a nation founded on and for freedom.

Whitman was not merely ”under [our] bootsoles” (88), he was everywhere – Lafayette Park, the White House, Department of the Treasury, the Washington Monument, Hotel W and the Red Robin Bar, Constitution Ave., etc.  Everywhere we went he was around the corner, or he was the corner:

Being in these places made me a believer in Whitman’s insistency that time need not be as much a disconnector as we would often have it.  In “Song of Myself” he writes, “Distant and dead resuscitate, / They show as the dial or move as the hands of me….and I am the clock myself” (63).  If Whitman is the clock, then we were keeping time through and by him as we journeyed through D.C.

This particularly hit home for me while visitning the Library of Congress, an experience which render even words insufficient descriptors of its impact.  As our class greedily gathered around the tables to see handwritten letters, pictures, books, a pen, a watch, a “Calamus” staff, glasses, his haversack, etc. it struck me that Whitman’s historical preservation consciousness was one of, if not the only, reasons why we had the fortune of viewing any of those things.  Whitman transcended time; he was aware of his surroundings, his potential legacy, and he succeeded in sharing them with others, even across a century.  A group of undergraduate students “oooh”ed and “aahh”ed over artifact after artifact because Whitman cared enough about preserving history to give us that.  We have become the ‘gymnastic learners’ he desired and we, in many ways, are forever connected to him because of that.

I thought Whitman would appreciate this sign:

upon discovering the existence of a “Walt Wit” belgian-style ale at the Philadelphia Brewing Co. felt we had no other choice but to scurry to Pennsylvania to retrieve it.  These are a few images from our journey.

“Afoot and light-hearted [we] took to the open road, / Healthy, free, the [beer] before [us], / The long brown path before [us] leading wherever [we] choose” (297)

Whitman AND Lincoln told us we were on the right path…

The lovely Philadelphia… the quest leaves the interstate…

Whitmanesque graffiti

A slightly disheveled bunch arriving at the brewery.

Our destination!

The side of the bottle reads, “The American poet Walt Whitman once portrayed a sunset over Philadelphia as,’…a broad tumble of clouds, with much golden haze and profusion of beaming shaft and dazzle.’ Pour yourself a bottle of Walt Wit Belgian Style White Ale and see what he was talking about . A pinch of spice and a whisper of citrus lend complexity to this fragrant, satisfying ale.

Walt Wit – it’s transcendentally delicious.”

These are both the lovely Meghan Edwards examing the bullet holes at the Innis House. 

My attempt at artistry: The information sign at the Innis House.  The house was probably owned by Martha Stephens who refused to leave her home (the Stephens’ House marked by the foundation nearby the Innis House) during the battle.  She provided drink to both Union and Confederate soldiers, an act of promoting peace between the two sides during a time of war.

“Leaves of Grass” near the Confederate Cemetery.  Looks like a beard to me… 

Walt Whitman gang sign? (outside Chatham Manor)

Ouside Chatham toward what was originally the front of the house.  The entrance was eventually changed to the garden side, the side we entered before our tour.

Jim Groom examining one of the catawba trees Whitman wrote about in Specimen Days.

Whitman, nestled in the crook of the catawba tree.  The passage in the second picture is from “Down at the Front” in Specimen Days.  It reads, “Out doors, at the foot of a tree, within ten yards of the front of the house, I notice a heap of amputated feet, legs, arms, hands, &c., a full load for a one-horse cart.  Several dead bodies lie near, each cover’d with its brown woolen blanket” (736).

Ben Brishcar & Sam Protich: a new kind of frontispiece (near the catawba trees at Chatham) 

The ghost of Whitman? or Erin Longbottom? (looking out from a window at Chatham Manor toward the catawba trees)

Whitman, are you under my Converse-soles too?

Sam Krieg looking out over the Rappahannok a few hundred yards away from the Chatham House.

Whitman’s dedication to creating one book as opposed to several different volumes is one of his most unique qualities when comparing him to other poets.  His desire for Leaves of Grass to become an almost scriptural text rather than simply another collection of poetry is represented in his persistence in revamping and revising the text until he felt it conveyed exactly what people needed to hear in the exact way they needed to hear it (in many ways this can be likened to the varying translations of the Bible).   The progression between the 1855 and the “Deathbed” editions, though the text was not extensively altered in content, shows the ways in which the text lived and changed as Whitman lived and changed.  There is little to no doubt that Whitman, had he not realized his failing health, would have continued to edit LoG.

After reading Longaker’s “The Last Sickness and the Death of Walt Whitman,” it’s striking to notice how Whitman’s attention to detail prevailed as he cataloged his symptoms, food and medicine intake, amount of sleep, etc., even until his death.  This attention is also shown in the slight alterations he made in the versions of LoG across time.  Every word counted and he slaved over his texts during each republication in order to make sure each one was in its proper place.  Often, he removed imagery that was no longer relevant; for instance, “the camera and plate are prepared, the lady must sit for her daguerreotype” (41) of 1855 is no longer present in 1892 as the use of the daguerreotype diminished at the end of the 1850s.  Even slight changes like, “Did you read in the seabooks of the oldfashioned frigate-fight? / Did you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars?” (67) in 1855 to “Would you hear of an old-time sea fight? / Would you learn who won by the light of the moon and stars? / List to the yarn, as my grandmother’s father the sailor told it to me” (227-228) place recognition in the power of the passage of time.  This allows the text to insist that events that occur in history do not lose their importance as time distances us from them, a point I believe was at the forefront of his mind at all times during the revision process. 

Whitman’s Leaves of Grass is a text that has withstood time because it pays so much attention to time.  There are few (if any) other writers in history who put as much effort in maintaining the relevance of one sociopolitical text, especially in the poetic realm, as Whitman did.  Therefore, to claim a superior importance of any one version of LoG neglects the importance of the entire vision that a text like LoG does not lose its importance over the years, its reader must simply alter the way he or she approaches it in order to appreciate its power and relevance in the current world.  Whitman started that process for his readers as he revised, but passed the torch to them to do the same after he was given to the earth and could no longer aid them.

Visitation

“Heaven and earth

What else is there?”

said Walt Whitman in your dream,

then he smiled at you

and disappeared,

but you wanted him to come back.

You wanted to tell him that there was more.

there was the hardsell

you had to give yourself to stay alive

HIV positive five years

and counting backward to the day

your other life was stripped

bare of its leaves

at the start of the war of disease

against the body.

You don’t have AIDS,

yet, you know it’s coming

like a train whose whistle

you can hear before you see it.

When you feel the tremors

of internal earthquake,

will you do the diva thing?

Will you Rudolf Nureyev your way on stage,

so ravaged and dazed

you don’t know who you are,

or commit your public suicide in private,

windows open wide

on the other side

where your father, Walt is waiting

to take you in his arms

like a baby returning there on waking,

beside the picnic basket

in the long grass,

where the brittle pages of a book

are turning to the end.

After noticing this, I started to poke around about the etymology and history of the months and days.  Although it seems that much is unknown about the history of these names, the most well-accepted origin and explanation is that the calendar as well as these divisions was established by the late Roman Empire, furthered by the Christian church, and widely assimilated into standardized use by the British Empire.  The days were originally named after Greek (and later substituted for Roman) gods.  Later, Germanic groups substituted similar gods for the Roman gods until the list became something like, Sun’s day, Moon’s day, Tiu’s day, Woden’s day, Thor’s day, Freya’s day, and Saturn’s day.  The Christian church maintained and encouraged the division of the seven day week as biblically, God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh, the Jewish holy day the Sabbath, which is observed on Saturday. 

As for the months of the year, the calendar used today is often referred to as the “Christian calendar” although it was developed in pre-Christian Rome.  There are two main versions of the Christian calendar: the Julian and the Gregorian calendars.  Before this, the original Roman calendar had ten months: Martius, Aprilis, Maius, Junius, Quintilis, Sextilis, September, October, November, and December.  The second king of Rome, Numa Pompilius, added January, or Januarius, and February or Februarius around 700 BCE.  The names January, March, April, May, and June were, like the days of the week, developed from the names of gods.  The names of the other months developed as follows: February stems from Februa, the Roman festival of purification, July, which Julius Caesar named after himself, August, which Augustus Caesar named after himself, and September, October, and December which (less creatively) simply mean seventh month, eighth month, ninth month, and tenth month, after their original placements on the Roman calendar. 

Head spinning yet? Good, mine too.  Now, for where I’m going with all of this; I find it fascinating that Whitman would reject the use of these common names in his final version of “Song of Myself.”  Perhaps I’m overanalyzing the heck out of this, but I feel that if I am right about this conscious effort to change the names, a probable motive could be Whitman’s attempt to wipe the slate clean of all history that America took from Europe, even something as seemingly mundane as day and month names.  It could also be a try at truly encouraging religious freedom.  By rejecting the use of one historical religion (whether the polytheistic Roman faith or the monotheistic Christian one) as a governance over society in any way, even in a mere commonly assimilated set of names, Whitman opens the door wide to a nation of true religious tolerance.  In naming the days and months by numbers instead of by gods or by Christian systems, Whitman is sets at accomplishing this little by little.  

Furthermore, God seems to play a very different role for Whitman in the 1892 version and thereby furthers my argument that Whitman is truly attempting widespread religious freedom.  In many of the places where God was aiding Whitman in the 1855 version, He is either completely removed or replaced by something or someone else.  For instance, in the 1855 “Song of Myself,” Whitman writes, “As God comes a loving bedfellow and sleeps at my side all night and close on the peep of the day,” (29) but in 1892 the passage is altered to, “As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side through the night, and withdraws at the peep of the day with stealthy tread” (191).  Similarly in 1855 he writes, “I visit the orchards of God and look at the spheric product” (63) and in 1892, “I visit the orchards of spheres and look at the product.”  Removing God in these ways, as well as reshaping Him throughout the text allows Whitman to, again, open up LoG to become something relatable to all individuals, no matter what faith or cultural background.  It is not so much that I think Whitman has altered his beliefs about religion as it is that I believe he is attempting to do a better job of disallowing the way he was religiously educated to interfere with the true religious freedom America was supposed to be founded on.

If you are interested in information about the days and calendar, I got a lot of my information from these sites:

http://www.crowl.org/Lawrence/time/months.html

http://www.crowl.org/Lawrence/time/days.html

http://www.webexhibits.org/calendars/year-history.html

http://www.webexhibits.org/calendars/week.html#anchor-origin

In “Where Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d,” Whitman uses both a “powerful western star” (459) (ironic that a star “in the east” was used to signify Chist’s birth in Bethlehem, suggesting Lincoln as an equal to the Christian Savior) and “Lilac blooming perennial” (459) (a flower that resurrects itself, if you will), he seats Lincoln in a place that would render him a Christ-figure.  Throughout the desperate elegiac tone of the poem, Whitman produces bits of imagery that lend themselves to this comparison, such as “with every leaf a miracle” (459) in reference to the lilac.  He also suggests the mourning of the churches themselves when he discusses the journey of Lincoln’s burial processional in, “The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs” (460).  By the last section of the poem, though the speaker departs from the lilac, he knows that it will return with spring (466), much like Christ is resurrected on the third day after his crucifixion.

This famous elegy to Lincoln is not however the only place in which Whitman near-literally seems to worship him.  In “Death of Abraham Lincoln,” Whitman refers to Lincoln as the nation’s “first great Martyr Chief” (1071).  The capitalization of this title suggests the importance of Lincoln’s martyrdom as if no other person who ever died for a cause could ever near the sacrifice that Lincoln made for the American people. He also describes Lincoln as having “the greatest, best, most characteristic, artistic, moral personality” as well as the “foundation and tie of all, as the future would grandly develop” (787).  Whitman even refers to the Battle of Bull Run as a “crucifixion day” (735) for Lincoln.  How’s that for obvious Christ-symbolism, Erkkila?

 Whitman seems, if I may use another heavy-handed religious term, to have desired to become Lincoln’s disciple.  Despite his limited interaction with Lincoln, a lot of what Whitman attempted to do hinged on, or at least mirrored, Lincoln’s own political and social moves.  For Whitman, Lincoln embodied the essence of democracy, the very thing that Whitman attempted throughout his life to encourage and sustain.  His love for Lincoln equated his love for the Union as he seemed often to fuse the two together.  Whitman’s elevation of both above himself easily cast Lincoln in the role of savior as it was the Union that needed the saving.

http://www.historydc.org/onlineexhibit/LincolnsWashington/Mr.%20Lincoln’s%20Assassination.asp

Presidential Box 1865

http://www.sonofthesouth.net/slavery/abraham-lincoln/lincoln-box-ford-theater.htm

Ford’s Theatre Now

http://broadwayworld.com/article/Fords_Theatre_Announces_History_on_Foot_Tours_for_Fall_2009_20090724

Ford’s Theatre sits at 511 10^th Street NW, the site originally occupied by the First Baptist Church of Washington which was built in 1833.  In 1859, the congregation abandoned the building when they merged with the Fourth Baptist Congregation formed on 13^th Street.  After a few years of occasional use for music performances, the building gained the interest of John T. Ford, a theatre entrepreneur from Baltimore who arrived in Washington D.C. in 1861.  On December 10 of that year, despite controversy from some members of the congregation who predicted “a dire fate for anyone who turned the former house of worship into a theatre,” (Olszewski 7) the church leased the space to Ford.  His contract allowed him to rent the building for five years with the promise of an opportunity to buy after that time.

After a brief sublease to George Christy, who ran the building as “The George Christy Opera House,” Ford closed the building and began renovation on February 28, 1862.  He invested 10,000 dollars in new construction and remodeling and opened the building three weeks later on March 19 under the name “Ford’s Atheneum” where ticket prices ranged from a quarter to a dollar per seat.  The athenaeum was quite successful and won the patronage of many wealthy and famous individuals including Abraham Lincoln whose first visit to the theatre was May 28, 1862 and who said of his experience, “Some people find me wrong to attend the theatre, but it serves me well to have a good laugh with a crowd of people” (Good 3).

Tragedy first struck the theatre on December 30, 1862 when a fire caused by a defective gas meter broke out in the cellar beneath the stage.  The fire blazed through everything, leaving only the blackened walls standing.  Fortunately no one was killed during the incident, but as Ford was only partially covered by fire insurance, the event left him with an estimated loss of 20,000 dollars.

With a refusal to lose heart, Ford began right away with plans to build a bigger and better theatre at the same site.  He wanted to expand the theatre to the north and add an additional wing to the south.  He hired James J. Gifford to design and supervise the reconstruction which began in February of 1863.  Though Ford had refused help from theatrical colleagues who offered to sponsor benefits to raise the money he lost in the fire, he welcomed the financial backing the project received from wealthy and influential Washington D.C. businessmen.  Though the reconstruction met a series of delays due to cave-ins from quicksand beneath the foundation and war-time supply delay problems, the building known as “Ford’s New Theatre” opened on August 27, 1863.

Between 1863 and 1865, the theatre thrived.  Many praised the theatre for its magnificent elegance and comfortable ventilation due to the three large hooded ventilators and ten hatches which provided the perfect amount of outside air.  Few theatres rivaled Ford’s for these few years.  Unfortunately, on April 14, 1865, the theatre became infamous as the location of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln during a performance of Our American Cousin.  One spectator recalled the event, “It is impossible to describe the intense excitement that prevailed in the theatre.  The audience arose as one person and horror was stamped on every face” (Good 45).  In the two seasons before the assassination, the theatre produced 495 evening performances, eight of which were attended by the president including “The Marble Heart” on November 9, 1863 starring none other than John Wilkes Booth, his future assassin.  

After the assassination, Ford’s Theatre was guarded by federal troops until July 7, 1865, the day the conspirators were hanged.  On July 8, the theatre was returned to Ford only to be seized on July 10 by order of Secretary of War, Edwin M. Stanton.  Some time after this, the theatre was leased to the government and then purchased by an act of Congress in 1866. 

In 1867, Ford’s Theatre was taken over by the US Army in order to house post-Civil War medical activities of the Army Surgeon General’s Office.  The building held an archive of Civil War medical records which were essential for verification of veteran’s pension claims, the Army Medical Museum, editorial offices for preparation of the multi-volume Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion, and the Library of the Surgeon General’s Office.  When Army needs outgrew the capacity of the theatre, several units were moved in 1887 to a new building known as the Army Medical Museum and Library, located on the Mall.

In June of 1893, a third tragedy occurred at the former theatre; part of the overloaded interior collapsed, killing 22 and injuring 65 federal troops working in the office of the Adjutant General for compiling official service records of Civil War veterans.  Ford’s Theatre was then closed by an order of Congress and was used as public document storage until 1932 when the Lincoln Museum opened inside which currently contains historical artifacts including the derringer John Wilkes Booth used as a murder weapon as well as a replica of the coat Lincoln wore when he was shot.

After public interest in restoring the building to its original condition grew following World War II, preliminary investigation began in 1955 when the National Capital Region prepared an engineering study under Public Law 372, 83d Congress.  Additional funds were given under Public Law 86-455, 86^th Congress, which authorized the National Park Service to begin with the research and prepare for construction, which was eventually completed in 1967.

Ford’s Theatre reopened in 1968 and according to its current website’s record of past seasons, ran a complete season of shows including a Gala Opening which was featured as a CBS TV special, John Brown’s Body, Comedy of Errors, and She Stoops to Conquer (Ford’s Theatre).  Since that time, the theatre produced full seasons of performances until August 2007 when it closed for its most extensive renovation since the 1960s.  The theatre reopened in February 2009 fully equipped with new seats, upgraded sound and lighting equipment, improved heating and AC, renovated restrooms, elevators, a new lobby with concessions, a new parlor for special events, and a series of updated stage capabilities.  As this year marked the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth, Ford’s Theatre is working toward becoming a major center for learning where people can examine the events leading up to the death of the 16^th president of the United States; the theatre’s mission is “to celebrate the legacy of Abraham Lincoln and to explore the American experience through theatre and education” (Ford’s Theatre) and is now back to running full seasons of performances.

Works Cited

Good, Timothy S., ed. We Saw Lincoln Shot: One Hundred Eyewitness Accounts. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1995. Print.

Ford’s Theatre. History of Medicinie. United States National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, 13 Sep. 2006. Web. 16 Oct. 2009. <http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/medtour/ford.html>

Ford’s Theatre. Web. 16 Oct. 2009. < http://www.fordstheatre.org/#>

Olszewski, George J. Restoration of Ford’s Theatre. Washington, D.C.: US. Government Printing Office, 1963. Print.

In Calder’s essay, she explains that though Whitman did not think marriage was in the cards for his life and though he did not envy husbands their wives, he did envy their ability to have children.  She even quotes Whitman as saying to a little girl that he wished he knew her when she chirps, “I know you.”  This image of Whitman as an affectionate father is much more appealing to me than Whitman “the stalker” or Whitman “the creeper” as our class has so affectionately named him.  His desire (though he is seemingly unable) to have children, mobilizes him into “adopting” the soldiers as his own sons.  His conversation with the little girl is reminiscent of “The Wound-Dresser” when he writes, “One turns to me his appealing eyes—poor boy! I never knew you, / Yet I think I could not refuse this moment to die for you, if that would save you” (444). 

 Throughout Drum-Taps, Whitman also refers to the soldiers as “sons” or “boys” as a father might to his child; he also does this in his letters to Peter Doyle, despite the two’s obvious intimate relationship.  Though this may be viewed as merely an age difference marker, the tenderness in which he refers to the soldiers suggests more of a relationship between him and them.  It is almost as if Whitman, having no children of his own, asserts himself as the father of the American people, thus adding to his lengthy list of titles.  As Calder points out, Whitman often called “the institution of father a failure” (198) and posited this as the reason many boys were driven to enlist.  This is yet another area in which Whitman’s desire to mend America’s mistakes manifests itself though Whitman offering himself as a means by which to fix the problem – an honorable pursuit, I think.

 Drum-Taps has ironically given me a better picture of Whitman, the man.  When he stops talking about being the savior of the nation, it seems he is better at actually being it.  Despite his more romantic relationships, it is more rewarding to view Whitman as a father rather than a lusty old man taking advantage of invalid soldiers.  Viewing him this way allows Whitman to be seen as a man who truly wanted to rekindle and reunite the nation through tender affection and love, the kind of unconditional love a parent would give a child.

One of the ways he gives voice to the war is through dividing poems into roles where a certain labeled speaker narrates that part of the poem.  This is not something we have seen before from Whitman and yet it occurs in several places in Drum-Taps.  For instance, “Song of the Banner at Daybreak” is divided into several speakers: Poet, Pennant, Child, Father, and Banner.  Though the poet can arguably represent Whitman himself (“O bard out of Manhattan”(423) etc.), by labeling the poet as Poet instead of “Walt Whitman, an American, one of the roughs” (50), as in “Song of Myself,” Whitman takes a step back. 

After reading “Specimen Days” last week and Drum-Taps this week, it is becoming more apparent that Whitman approached his work very differently during the Civil War.  For him, the war was more than just unnecessary violence; it was a blatant attack at the heart of the entire premise of America.  By removing himself from “Song of the Banner at Daybreak,” Whitman shows just how difficult it was for him to assess and come to terms with his crumbling country.  The poet here still speaks out as omniscient, though the other speakers (particularly the banner and pennant) and even at times the poet himself seem to suggest that the poet is not completely sufficient in getting at the heart of how the war was affecting people.  The poet even explains that he learned from the child in, “My hearing and tongue are come to me, (a little child taught me,)” (425).

The child in this poem also seems to be the most distinct voice of reason, which is perhaps Whitman’s way of suggesting that America return to a place nearer its birth, when the country was filled with a greater innocence, courage, and child-like wonderment of the American flag which, according to the child, is “so broad it covers the whole sky.”  The father provides a weathered contrast to this example, as he calls the child “foolish babe” and claims that he fills him “with anguish.”  The father attempts to get the child to focus on other things like money and property (sound familiar?), while the child prefers to focus on the banner and pennant, which represent America.

The poem closes with the poet’s longest monologue of the section; he claims within the last two lines, “I see but you, O warlike pennant! O banner so broad, with stripes, I sing you only, / Flapping up there in the wind” (426).  Here, Whitman is not singing of himself as before, here he sings only of America and those things that represent it.  This shift for Whitman ironically may help his readers to connect with him as they focus on the tenderness and real desperation with which he confronts America.

I say that the war may be viewed as a recipe for the breakdown of the soul by looking at the connections Whitman often made between the soul and body.  As frequently discussed in class, Whitman viewed the human body as ultimate perfection, writing often of its splendors and praising its uses and beauty.  He also declared that the soul and body are in a completely mutually beneficial relationship and that they rely on each other through this; this is shown when he writes, “The spirit receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body” (21) in the preface to the 1855 Leaves of Grass.  As Whitman viewed, recorded, and even engaged in attempting to mend the devastation brought about by the war, he focused particularly on the hundreds of amputations various soldiers (from both the North and the South) were forced to endure.  He writes in “Specimen Days,” “I notice a heap of amputated feet, legs, arms, hands, &c., a full load for a one-horse cart” (736) and mentions these severed and disposed appendages many times throughout the remainder of the text, as well as within several of his more graphic war poems.  The physical dismemberment of the limbs of soldiers, the removal of pieces of their bodies, can equally be said to allow for the chipping away of their spirits as well.  In losing one part of the aforementioned relationship, the whole deteriorates.

This is even more difficult for Whitman to grapple with as it is the result of America against America – a kind of national suicide.  The spiritual dismemberment that follows physical dismemberment hits him in a way that leaves him reaching for ways to bring the country back to some level of commonality.  He attempts to accomplish this by focusing on the natural world, the land that remains beautiful despite all of the violence and tragedy.  He writes:

The night was very pleasant, at times, the moon shining out full and clear, all Nature so calm in itself, the early summer grass so rich, and foliage of the trees—yet there the battle raging, and many good fellows lying helpless, with new accessions to them, and every minute amid the rattle of muskets and crash of cannon, (for there was an artillery contest too,) the red life-blood oozing out from heads or trunks or limbs upon that green and dew-cool grass (746).

In illuminating a battle scene by jumping back and forth between the harsh brutality of war and the peaceful serenity provided in and by nature, Whitman seems to hope to force his readers and the American people back into a place where their spirits and bodies may be uncompromised and where they may remain united.  In his writing, he seeks to piece together a people that continually divide themselves and hopes to stop them from doing so before there is nothing left to reunite.

Socially outcast, the body of the prostitute requires the intervention of the poet’s speaker in order that she may be represented visibly, in a democracy in which many are invisible. If persons were rotting on the pavement within sight of the Capitol, this compelling poem enacts a recovery of the rightful place of human solidarity among strangers.

Whitman’s using a prostitute’s death to expose the problems of a “democracy” that chooses to ignore the needs of its members is interesting because prostitution is also an issue he again addresses in “To a Common Prostitute.”  This poem struck me particularly due to its closeness with scripture in Jesus’ encounter with the adulteress in John 8:1-11, which says (if you’ll allow my lengthy quotation for those that aren’t familiar with the story):

¹But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. ²At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. ³The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group ⁴and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. ⁵In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” ⁶They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.             

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. ⁷When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” ⁸Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.  ⁹At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. ¹⁰Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

¹¹“No one, sir,” she said. 

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.” (New International Version)

This passage struck me as similar to Whitman’s poems in its direct address to a woman who has otherwise been scorned and put out by society (not to mention that this passage is often falsely thought on as being about a prostitute…AND Jesus often hung out among and talked with prostitutes similarly).  In “To a Common Prostitute,” Whitman addresses the prostitute in much the same way that Jesus addresses this adulteress, allowing him to again transfer himself (not just the speaker but “Walt Whitman, liberal and lusty as Nature” (512) ) into the position of savior.  It also allows Whitman to argue for a world in which even those considered different or even immoral would be given an equal opportunity to exist by using subtle biblical allusion as is so often his conduit in driving home many of his points.      

Now, in coming back to “The City Dead-House,” Whitman (as Mancuso points out) uses the death of a prostitute to represent the difficulties of the current application and assessment of democracy in the budding and troubled United States.  Whitman speaks out for a woman who has both literally and figuratively been silenced by the government.  My point here is that it seems to me that Whitman would have (as has been often suggested in class) himself viewed as a Christ-figure, a savior, and further that he would have himself seated as the savior of democracy.  In linking these poems through the prostitute, an outcast, he speaks up for his idea of what democracy should (or rather what it should not) be, bringing to mind the prejudices between North and South, blacks and whites, as well as other issues of disagreement and confrontation throughout Whitman’s lifetime.

I as thinking about Whitman’s long lines and the fact that he breaks the boundaries of the page, and I  wanted to share some thoughts with you all.  Whitman really seems to be pushing the reader to explore beyond the beliefs that he/she carries.  He proves that he cannot be contained, even with in the page.  However, I think that is goes even deeper than this.  He proves that he is into breaking boundaries in all he does, whether it be sexuality, thoughts on women, ect, but also, he is breaking the boundaries of the page.  This breaking of the page’s boundaries cause the reader to see a need to break the boundaries he/she puts up in life and explore past the outer layer into what lies beneath, and thus seeing the layer underneath the surface.  Looking at the underlayer of his work, as well as the issues that surround us, allows us to see what truly matters.

-Jess

Walt Whitman at the Lincoln Memorial

By my side or back of me Eve following,

Or in front, and I following her just the same” (248)

Right away, in the first poem of “Children of Adam,” “To the Garden of the World,” Whitman proposes a utopia that most of us cannot fathom as ever being America.  But, as he addresses “the world anew ascending” (248), he brings to mind both the biblical Garden of Eden as well as the developing nation.  His act of situating America as the “garden of the world” surfaces many interesting ideas understood through exploring several points of comparison between Eden and the way Whitman sees our nation.

Suggesting that one be “content with the present, content with the past” drives home a point that I brought up in class on Tuesday.  That is, that Whitman is concerned with and urges America to ascertain itself in the present, and further, to be ok with it.  In Eden, utopia was lost to Adam and Eve after they ate of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, but through eating the fruit, they exchanged ignorance for knowledge even if it came hand in hand with a trade of bliss for suffering.  Beginning anything is, in many ways, an act of embracing a world of ignorance; therefore, the people breaking away from England to begin America were readily exchanging knowledge, comfort, and protection, for vast ignorance and uncertainty.  But, through this line, Whitman urges the people of America to think on this transition only in a way that brings them contentment, and to embrace the here and now as it comes rather than concern themselves with fear or regret.

 Further, Whitman introduces the importance of equality (most directly between men and women here) as a necessary ingredient to achieving contentment with the present and past when he introduces Eve.  Though many of you have been grappling with Whitman’s view on women and what role he desires that they play in his America, (I am still struggling with that myself) it is clear here that, at the very least, he acknowledges women’s importance and presence in the setting forth on this journey into knowledge and discovery.  Whitman suggests that every man and every woman may relate to one another at this level because no one knows what is ahead and therefore it makes no difference who leads and who follows; everyone is embarking on new territory.

 Lastly, (well, for this blog at least) Whitman’s positioning of himself as Adam allows him to become, figuratively speaking, the man who begat all other men.  This is Whitman again placing himself as the leader, the prophet, the father of the American people, allowing him to present himself as the poet America “needs” (as we discussed extensively in class last week).  His role as Adam is important because it suggests that he, being the first man, was made in the direct image of God and therefore may be considered closest to him. It also makes the claim, as this poem seems to put an optimistic spin on the usually depressing story of the expulsion from Eden, that walking away from the direct presence of God, or any authority, to discover one’s own way may be a better and more exhilarating way to achieve peace and unity.

Triphammer: a massive power hammer having a head that is tripped and allowed to fall by cam or lever action (Merriam-Webster)

See how a triphammer works…

(http://explorepahistory.com/displayimage.php?imgId=3905)

Triphammers were often powered by a water wheel and are known to have been used as early as 20 AD in China. They were used widely for blacksmithing until the Industrial Revolution.  At that time, triphammers fell out of favor and were replaced with something referred to as simply, the power hammer  Reference.com).  As the Industrial Revolution occurred prior to Whitman writing “Song of Myself”, it is interesting that he writes of this older technology instead of proclaiming, “Where the power hammers…”  This perhaps shows Whitman’s attention to all things going into and coming out of “revolutions” or any other change that America goes through.  Earlier in the poem he writes, “I am afoot with my vision,” (59) and Whitman is afoot with his vision everywhere, even where technology is not yet advanced, or where people are not yet advanced.

What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for I walked
down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache self-conscious looking
at the full moon.
  In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon
fruit supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
  What peaches and what penumbras!  Whole families shopping at
night!  Aisles full of husbands!  Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes!
–and you, García Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?

  I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber, poking
among the meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery boys.
  I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the pork chops?   
What price bananas?  Are you my Angel?
  I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans following you,
and followed in my imagination by the store detective.
  We strode down the open corridors together in our solitary fancy
tasting artichokes, possessing every frozen delicacy, and never passing the
cashier.

  Where are we going, Walt Whitman?  The doors close in a hour.
Which way does your beard point tonight?
  (I touch your book and dream of our odyssey in the supermarket and
feel absurd.)
  Will we walk all night through solitary streets?  The trees add shade
to shade, lights out in the houses, we’ll both be lonely.
  Will we stroll dreaming of the lost America of love past blue automo-
biles in driveways, home to our silent cottage?
  Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher, what America
did you have when Charon quit poling his ferry and you got out on a
smoking bank and stood watching the boat disappear on the black waters of
Lethe?

“On a Love Theme by Walt Whitman” – Allen Ginsberg

I’ll go into the bedroom silently and lie down between the bridegroom and the bride, those bodies fallen from heaven stretched out waiting naked and restless, / arms resting over their eyes in the darkness, / bury my face in their shoulders and breasts, breathing their skin, and stroke and kiss neck and mouth and make back be open and known, / legs raised up crook’d to receive, cock in the darkness driven tormented and attacking / roused up from hole to itching head, / bodies locked shuddering naked, hot hips and buttocks screwed into each other / and eyes, eyes glinting and charming, widening into looks and abandon, / and moans of movement, voices, hands in air, hands between thighs, hands in moisture on softened lips, throbbing contraction of bellies till the white come flow in the swirling sheets, / and the bride cry for forgiveness, and the groom be covered with tears of passion and compassion, / and I rise up from the bed replenished with last intimate gestures and kisses of farewell – / all before the mind wakes, behind shades and closed doors in a darkened house / where the inhabitants roam unsatisfied in the night, nude ghosts seeking each other out in the silence.

I just wanted to put these poems out there for your reading pleasure…I’ll probably talk more about them later.  I enjoy Ginsberg’s work and was delighted to come across these poems.  The second poem is particularly interesting for where we are in the class as it is a response to a portion of “A Song of Myself” where Whitman writes, “I turn the bridegroom out of bed and stay with the bride / myself, / And tighten her all night to my thighs and lips” (64). (Sorry the format of the second is without line breaks)

            Despite this command and call, Whitman also seems to realize that America still has a long way to go before its people are completely unified.  This is what Margaret Fuller was getting at in her essay, particularly when she discusses America’s relationship with England and its tendency to borrow from England’s practices and culture even when those practices are incongruous with the United States Constitution.  Whitman, perhaps inspired by Fuller’s article, speaks directly to this problem throughout his work.  He seems to agree that America is a separate and individual nation and that it needs to start acting like one by, at a minimum, learning to embrace its entire people.  It is for this reason that education becomes so important.  By striving to achieve an education, each individual becomes more cognizant of the thread which binds all human beings.  He or she also begins to realize that learning not only expands knowledge, but often encourages acceptance and dissolves prejudice.  When one can learn to understand that all people are equal, he or she will begin to see in their surroundings the ways in which people are connected.  In “Crossing the Brooklyn Ferry,” Whitman writes, “What is more subtle than this which ties me to the woman or man that looks in my face? / Which fuses me into you now, and pours my meaning into you?” (312) as well as claims throughout the poem, “I, too…” in order to better illuminate the benefits of accepting that people can be connected through experience or even through the very act of living.    

            Adrienne Riche, in her commencement address titled “Claiming an Education,” says, “you cannot afford to think of yourselves as being here to receive an education; you will do much better to think of yourselves a being here to claim one” (Riche 19).  Though Riche was speaking to a women’s college nearly a century later (in 1977), Whitman would have undoubtedly agreed that being active in seeking an education is the only way to truly learn.  He continues in “Democratic Vistas” to stress that active learning will produce “a nation of supple and athletic minds, well-train’d, intuitive, used to depend on themselves, and not on a few coteries of writers” (1017).  It is through education and learning to accept and even embrace differences that make America what it is intended to be, a nation that is truly by the people and for the people.

Riche, Adrienne. “Claiming an Education” Women: Images and Realities. Eds. Amy Kesselman, Lily D. McNair, Nancy Schniedewind. New York: McGraw Hill, 1995. 19-21.

Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am,

Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary,

Looks down, is erect, bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,

Looks with its sidecurved head curious what will come next,

Both in and out of the game, and watching and wondering at it.

Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with linguists and contenders,

I have no mockings or arguments…I witness and wait.