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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Walt Whitman
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July 31 - August 17, 2023
O Captain! My Captain!
O Captain! My Captain!
By Blue Ontario’s Shore
Of these States the poet is the equable man, Not in him but off from him things are grotesque, eccentric, fail of their full returns,
He bestows on every object or quality its fit proportion, neither more nor less,
He is the arbiter of the diverse, he is the key, He is the equalizer...
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In war he is the best backer of the war, he fetches artillery as good as the engineer’s, he can make every word he speaks draw blood,
He judges not as the judge judges but as the sun failing round helpless thing, As he sees the farthest he has the most faith,
He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and denouement, He sees eternity in men and women, he does not see men and women as dreams or dots.
For the great Idea, the idea of perfect and free individuals, For that, the bard walks in advance, leader of leaders, The attitude of him cheers up slaves and horrifies foreign despots.
Are you he who would assume a place to teach or be a poet here in the States?
Section 12. Most impressive.
By the roadside others disdainfully toss’d.
End of section 12.
Rhymes and rhymers pass away, poems distill’d from poems pass away, The swarms of reflectors and the polite pass, and leave ashes,
He masters whose spirit masters, he tastes sweetest who results sweetest in the long run,
Already a nonchalant breed, silently emerging, appears on the streets, People’s lips salute only doers, lovers, satisfiers, positive knowers, There will shortly be no more priests, I say their work is done,
Are your body, days, manners, superb? after death you shall be superb,
Underneath all, individuals, I swear nothing is good to me now that ignores individuals, The American compact is altogether with individuals, The only government is that which makes minute of individuals, The whole theory of the universe is directed unerringly to one single individual — namely to You.
I dare not shirk any part of myself, Not any part of America good or bad,
Thus by blue Ontario’s shore, While the winds fann’d me and the waves came trooping toward me, I thrill’d with the power’s pulsations, and the charm of my theme was upon me, Till the tissues that held me parted their ties upon me. And I saw the free souls of poets, The loftiest bards of past ages strode before me, Strange large men, long unwaked, undisclosed, were disclosed to me.
O my rapt verse, my call, mock me not!
Section 20. Ode to the Bard.
You by my charm I invoke.
The end.
There Was a Child Went Forth
The City Dead-House
No "God bless America" here!
By the city dead-house by the gate, As idly sauntering wending my way from the clangor, I curious pause, for lo, an outcast form, a poor dead prostitute brought, Her corpse they deposit unclaim’d, it lies on the damp brick pavement,
But the house alone — that wondrous house — that delicate fair house — that ruin!
That little house alone more than them all — poor, desperate house! Fair, fearful wreck — tenement of a soul — itself a soul,
Dead house of love — house of madness and sin, crumbled, crush’d, House of life, erewhile talking and laughing — but ah, poor house, dead even then, Months, years, an echoing, garnish’d house — but dead, dead, dead.
This Compost
Interesting. The circle of life, so to speak.
Song of Prudence
Powerful. First composed in 1855. See 1855 intro pp. 33-34. Highlighted.
The indirect is just as much as the direct, The spirit receives from the body just as much as it gives to the body, if not more.
Not one word or deed, not venereal sore, discoloration, privacy of the onanist, Putridity of gluttons or rum-drinkers, peculation, cunning, betrayal, murder, seduction, prostitution, But has results beyond death as really as before death.
Charity and personal force are the only investments...
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Who has been wise receives interest, Savage, felon, President, judge, farmer, sailor, mechanic, literat, young, old, it is the same, The interest will come round — all will come round.
Did you guess any thing lived only its moment? The world does not so exist, no parts palpable or impalpable so exist, No consummation exists without being from some long previous consummation, and that from some other, Without the farthest conceivable one coming a bit nearer the beginning than any.
Whatever satisfies souls is true; Prudence entirely satisfies the craving and glut of souls, Itself only finally satisfies the soul, The soul has that measureless pride which revolts from every lesson but its own.
What is prudence is indivisible, Declines to separate one part of life from every part, Divides not the righteous from the unrighteous or the living from the dead, Matches every thought or act by its correlative, Knows no possible forgiveness or deputed atonement,
Knows that the young man who composedly peril’d his life and lost it has done exceedingly well for himself without doubt, That he who never peril’d his life, but retains it to old age in riches and ease, has probably achiev’d nothing for himself worth mentioning,
Out from Behind This Mask [To Confront a Portrait]
A poem about Whitman's portrait in the "Leaves of Grass" 1876 edition.
(As the first volume of a tale perused and laid away, and this the second, Songs, ventures, speculations, presently to close,)
1855 and 1876 editions?
Vocalism
At one time, Whitman had considered being an orator.
O what is it in me that makes me tremble so at voices? Surely whoever speaks to me in the right voice, him or her I shall follow, As the water follows the moon, silently, with fluid steps, anywhere around the globe.
You Felons on Trial in Courts
Inside these breast-bones I lie smutch’d and choked, Beneath this face that appears so impassive hell’s tides continually run, Lusts and wickedness are acceptable to me, I walk with delinquents with passionate love, I feel I am of them — I belong to those convicts and prostitutes myself, And henceforth I will not deny them — for how can I deny myself?
Laws for Creations
Originally entitled "American Laws".
What do you suppose creation is? What do you suppose will satisfy the soul, except to walk free and own no superior? What do you suppose I would intimate to you in a hundred ways, but that man or woman is as good as God? And that there is no God any more divine than Yourself?
To a Common Prostitute
Frequently cited for censorship.
My girl
Originally written as "my love".
significant look
Originally written as "a kiss on the lips".
I Was Looking a Long While
First published as "Chants Democratic" in LG 1860. Changed to this title in 1867.
Miracles
I love this poem!
