Whitman gave no indication in his journal that he had studied the Bhagavad Gita. But in his poetry he declared over and over again the very same truth that Krishna taught to Arjuna on the field of Kurukshetra: “Our bodies are known to end, but the embodied self is enduring, indestructible, and immeasurable … Weapons do not cut it, fire does not burn it, waters do not wet it … it is enduring, all-pervasive, fixed, immovable, and timeless.”
