jennyandwalt

A couple days ago, I have received a call from my father saying that my grandfather is in the hospital undergoing a surgery. Apparently a blood vein or something of that matter has popped and is clotted in a small area of his brain. Old age and death is quite a transparent matter, I think. Yet on the other hand, it’s quite opaque. Old age and death seems so simple, yet if you think about it, it’s quite complicated.

This was how Walt Whitman must’ve felt.
My grandfather, once a Korean general, a great fighter in life and at heart, is now wilting away. Or rather, will soon wilt away into the ground. Walt Whitman, too, “casting backward glances over [his] travel’d road” “[a]fter years of those aims and pursuits” is now at his deathbed when he writes the Deathbed edition of “Leaves of Grass:” Second Annex: Good-Bye my Fancy and his “Backward Glance o’er Travel’d Roads. (Whitman 657).
I personally do not know death. I do not know old age. I do not know what it feels like to have traveled over many different types of roads to be contemplating what it feels like to be near death. However, I believe Walt Whitman and my grandfather do know…

After reading the First and Second Annex of the Deathbed editions of “Leaves of Grass,” I felt many emotions within Whitman’s writings. I could feel him at times, optimistic–trying to take death and old age as it is with positive spirit. However, other times, I can feel him like a normal everyday man, not a great poet: afraid, nervous, not-knowing-what-to-do, not-knowing-what-to-express. Though most of his poems do reflect a type of optimism in face of death, he too, is human. However, one of the many aspects I admire of Walt Whitman is his willingness to live to the end. Just because his body is now a bit sluggish, tired, and in pain or even if the fear of death may at times disturb his heart, he still, to the end, does not put his pen down. If you read in NY Times in 1888, you can see how Whitman is still focused on America. He wants to finish what he has to complete before he dies:
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=940CEFDA143AE033A25756C1A9609C94699FD7CF

I find his spirit and attitudes toward life and death quite admirable. Again, I am reminded of how he deserves to be called the Great Poet of America…
Now on a personal note, if only my grandfather could have a tiny bit of Whitman’s spirit…

Who would’ve ever thought cemeteries  could be so beautiful, let alone tranquil? When one thinks of cemeteries, what comes to mind? For me, I think of rough-cornered tombstones; dark, mist-filled nights; black cats; not little cute ghosts like Casper, but you know, the real ones, the real ghosts. Well, maybe that was a bit too over-exaggerated. But really. Would would’ve thought that Whitman’s cemetery would be like that of an actual haven? Not only do we find real nature scenes coming to life in Whitman’s poetry, but he even brings them to life after death. His tomb was literally coming out from the ground. Surrounded by nature, literally connected with roots from trees, it was almost as if Whitman was a part of the ground… the grass. It was amazing. The experience was so tranquil and beautiful… This may sound a bit bizarre, but it was so nice that if I could, I would want to live nearby somewhere by the pond beside Whitman’s grave. Don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty sane. You just have to experience going to Whitman’s cemetery yourself to see what I mean.

WHITMAN, DEATH, AND… WATER?

After reading Whitman’s Second Annex: Good-bye My Fancy I became deeply curious about Whitman’s blatant and not-so-blatant use of water with correlation to death. Perhaps it’s merely my own sensitivity to the inferences of water, oceans, wetness, moisture, etc. when reading Whitman’s poetry during his last years; however, if  you read with a bit more care at Whitman’s Second Annex, you will notice how he clearly does make several inferences of water.

Take for instance in his “Preface Note to 2d Annex:”

Last droplets of and after spontaneous rain,
From many limpid distillations and past showers;
(Will they germinate anything? mere exhalations as they all are –the land’s and sea’s –America’s;
Will they filter to any deep emotion? any heart and brain?)

Then read a couple lines further. Whitman speaks of sea creatures and other parts of the ocean: “In fact, here I am these current years 1890 and ’91, (each successive fortnight getting stiffer and stuck deeper) much like some hard-cased dilapidated grim ancient shell-fish or time-bang’d conch (no legs, utterly non-locomotive) cast up high and dry on the shore-sands, helpless to move anywhere –nothing left but behave myself quiet, and while away the days yet assign’d, and discover if there is anything for the said grim and time-bang’d conch to be got at last out of inherited good spirits and primal buoyant centre-pulses down there deep somewhere within his gray-blurr’d old shell …And old as I am I feel to-day almost a part of some frolicsome wave…”

As you can see, Whitman begins to introduce inferences of the water, the ocean, and anything related to the wetness or moisture. He speaks of weak, aged sea creatures like “the hard-cased dilapidated grim ancient shell-fish or time-bang’d conch” and the “frolicsome wave.” What does he mean? Why does he correlate water or natures, which are related to the ocean to death? However, the more interesting aspect is that he does not stop there. Further throughout the Second Annex, he uses themes of water to express his thoughts of dying and death. Take a look at the first poem listed: “Sail Out for Good, Eidolon Yact.” Or even the poem thereafter: “Lingering Last Drops.” These are only a few. Whitman uses lots of water imagery to express death.

But why?

And because like how curiosity killed the cat, to satiate my curiosity, I did some basic research on symbols of water. Based on the universal dream symbols, not only water, but fire as well, have an interesting meaning when they come together: http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/science_of_dreams/12814/2

A perfect example is shown in “A Voice from Death” from Second Annex. Whitman speaks of death. But at the same time, he expresses them with water and fire: “Although I come and unannounc’d, in horror and in pang, / In pouring flood and fire, and wholesale elemental crash” (Whitman 649). If you read the site, and take a second look at some of Whitman’s death poems, you will find how Whitman must’ve had purpose in correlating death with water.

But this doesn’t stop here.

Now I’m even more curious as to what some of the symbols Whitman had in mind when writing these death/water poems…

After reading Whitman’s “Pensive on Her Dead Gazing” from SONGS OF PARTING, (though it may be a bit of a stretch) I personally heard Whitman’s mother, Louisa Van Velsor, through the image of Mother of All or in other words, Mother Nature. I think this poem could be read in three ways: Mother of All as Mother Nature;  Mother of All as Louisa Van Velsor; Mother of All as mothers of all people. If reading it the second way, Whitman would be personifying Mother Nature.

According to Whitman’s biography, when his brother went to war there are evidences of Louisa sending Whitman and her other sons letters filled with anxiety and love. In this sense, with a psychoautobiographical approach, it may be Whitman secretly expressing his feelings during the time of war. This may be a poem dedicated to his mother who was worried sick at the time.

Or if we read the poem the latter way where Whitman personifies Mother Nature as mothers of all sons who went to war, we would definitely be able to see the correlation. The diction and imagery Whitman uses are so genuine and heartfelt.

By and by, I was moved after reading this poem. It has so much power and strong descriptions of death and realities of war that it seems so real. As if the war is happening right in front of my eyes. I could almost feel the earth trembling beneath me. I think this is one of Whitman’s greatest styles in his poetry: making the text come to life.