by Walt Whitman
The prose of his “Specimen Days,” indeed, is often nearer to poetry than his verse:
Much of the time he sleeps, or half sleeps.... I often come and sit by him in perfect silence; he will breathe for ten minutes as softly and evenly as a young babe asleep. Poor youth, so handsome, athletic, with profuse beautiful shining hair. One time as I sat looking at him while he lay asleep, he suddenly, without the least start awaken’d, open’d his eyes, gave me a long steady look, turning his face very slightly to gaze easier—one long, clear, silent look—a slight sigh—then turn’d back and went into his doze again. Little he knew, poor death-stricken boy, the heart of the stranger that hover’d near.
The western star, Venus, in the earlier hours of evening has never been so large, so clear; it seems as if it told something, as if it held rapport indulgent with humanity, with us Americans. The sky dark blue, the transparent night, the planets, the moderate west wind, the elastic temperature, the miracle of that great star, and the young and swelling moon swimming in the west, suffused the soul. Then I heard slow and clear the deliberate notes of a bugle come up out of the silence ... firm and faithful, floating along, rising, falling leisurely, with here and there a long-drawn note.... sounding tattoo.
“A steady rain, dark and thick and warm,” he writes again, two days after Gettysburg. “The cavalry camp is a ceaseless field of observation to me. This forenoon there stood the horses, tether’d together, dripping, steaming, chewing their hay. The men emerge from their tents, dripping also. The fires are half-quench’d.” There is a poetic poise in this brief, vivid statement, apart from its bare economy of means. It is the lump awaiting the leaven no less than is “Cavalry Crossing a Ford.” To this supreme spectator an apple orchard in May, even the White House in moonlight, no more and no less than these battle-scenes, rendered up their dignity, life, and beauty, their true human significance. But in “Drum-Taps” the witness is not always so satisfactory. The secret has evaporated in the effort to make poetry, or half-consciously to inject a moral, to play the Universal Bard. There creeps into the words a tinge of the raw and the grotesque. The poet has the look of a cowboy off the stage, tanned with grease-paint. But again and again the secret creeps back and some lovely emanation of poetry is added to it:
Look down fair moon and bathe this scene,
Pour softly down night’s nimbus floods on faces ghastly, swollen, purple,
On the dead on their backs with arms toss’d wide,
Pour down your unstinted nimbus sacred moon.
Or this, called “Reconciliation”:
Word over all, beautiful as the sky,
Beautiful that war and all its deeds of carnage must in time be utterly lost,
That the hands of the sisters Death and Night incessantly softly wash again, and ever again, this soil’d world;
For my enemy is dead, a man divine as myself is dead,
I look where he lies white-faced and still in the coffin—I draw near,
Bend down and touch lightly with my lips the white face in the coffin.
The bonds of rhyme shackled him, deprived him of more than freedom. He is like a wild bird that suddenly perceives the bars of its small cage across the blue of the sky. And yet the finer his poems are, the nearer they approach to definite rhythmical design. One has only to compare “O Captain! my Captain!” with “Hushed be the Camps To-day” to perceive this curious paradox. They are both of them memories of his beloved Lincoln, whom he had many times seen, with that peculiarly close and transatlantic curiosity of his, riding at a jog-trot, on a good-sized, easy-going grey horse, with his escort of yellow-striped cavalry behind him, through the streets of Washington—dressed in black, somewhat rusty and dusty, with a black, stiff hat, almost as ordinary in attire as the commonest man. That heroic face, too, he had pierced; and caught from it the deep, subtle, indirect expression, that only the long-gone master-painters of the Old World could have seized and immortalized. And in yet another memory of this great American Whitman attains to his best and highest, “When Lilacs Last in the Doorway Bloom’d.” It is one of the most beautiful of poems, of the purest intuition, of a consummate, if unconscious, artistry. Whose voice is it that rings and echoes, now low and tender, now solemn and desolate, now clear, full, victorious, out of its cloistral solitude—that of the mourner himself, of all-heedfull, heedless Nature, of the immortal soul of man, or just a bird, the shy and hidden, sweet, small hermit thrush? The last division of his life’s work—his fond Epic, his cosmic “inventory”—as Whitman planned it, was to be devoted to the chaunting of songs of death and immortality. The soldier to whom he read of Christ’s Resurrection talked of death to him, and said he did not fear it. He talked to a man who did not enjoy religion in the way a Christian means, to whom the mystery of Easter is an all-sufficing “reliance.” But Whitman not only did not fear death. The thought of it was to him the strangest of raptures, the reverie of a child dreaming of a distant mother, soon to come again. Death and immortality were but two aspects of the same blessed hope to this man, who poured out his life in a turgid fount of ecstatic joy in living:
... And I saw askant the armies,
I saw as in noiseless dreams hundreds of battle-flags,
Borne through the smoke of the battles and pierc’d with missiles I saw them,
And carried hither and yon through the smoke, and torn and bloody,
And at last but a few shreds left on the staffs (and all in silence),
And the staffs all splintered and broken.
I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them,
And the white skeletons of young men, I saw them,
I saw the debris and debris of all the slain soldiers of the war,
But I saw they were not as was thought,
They themselves were fully at rest, they suffer’d not,
The living remain’d and suffer’d, the mother suffer’d,
And the wives and the child and the musing comrade suffer’d,
And the armies that remain’d suffer’d....
Come lovely and soothing death,
Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving,
In the night, in the day, to all, to each,
Sooner or later delicate death.
Prais’d be the fathomless universe,
For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious,
And for love, sweet love—but praise! praise! praise!
For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding death.
Dark mother always gliding near with soft feet
Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome?
Then I chant it for thee, I glorify thee above all,
I bring thee a song that when thou must indeed come, come unfalteringly.
FIRST O SONGS FOR A PRELUDE
First O songs for a prelude,
Lightly strike on the stretch’d tympanum pride and joy in my city,
How she led the rest to arms, how she gave the cue,
How at once with lithe limbs unwaiting a moment she sprang,
(O superb! O Manhattan, my own, my peerless!
O strongest you in the hour of danger, in crisis! O truer than steel!)
How you sprang—how you threw off the costumes of peace with indifferent hand,
How your soft opera-music changed, and the drum and fife were heard in their stead,
How you led to the war, (that shall serve for our prelude, songs of soldiers,)
How Manhattan drum-taps led.
Forty years had I in my city seen soldiers parading,
Forty years as a pageant, still unawares the lady of this teeming and turbulent city,
Sleepless amid her ships, her houses, her incalculable wealth,
With her million children around her, suddenly,
At dead of night, at news from the south,
Incens’d struck with clinch’d hand the pavement.
A shock electric, the night sustain’d it,
Till with ominous hum ou
r hive at daybreak pour’d out its myriads.
From the houses then and the workshops, and through all the doorways,
Leapt they tumultuous, and lo! Manhattan arming.
To the drum-taps prompt,
The young men falling in and arming,
The mechanics arming, (the trowel, the jack-plane, the blacksmith’s hammer, tost aside with precipitation,)
The lawyer leaving his office and arming, the judge leaving the court,
The driver deserting his wagon in the street, jumping down, throwing the reins abruptly down on the horses’ backs,
The salesman leaving the store, the boss, book-keeper, porter, all leaving;
Squads gather everywhere by common consent and arm,
The new recruits, even boys, the old men show them how to wear their accoutrements, they buckle the straps carefully,
Outdoors arming, indoors arming, the flash of the musketbarrels,
The white tents cluster in camps, the arm’d sentries around, the sunrise cannon and again at sunset,
Arm’d regiments arrive every day, pass through the city, and embark from the wharves,
(How good they look as they tramp down to the river, sweaty, with their guns on their shoulders!
How I love them! how I could hug them, with their brown faces and their clothes and knapsacks cover’d with dust!)
The blood of the city up—arm’d! arm’d! the cry everywhere,
The flags flung out from the steeples of churches and from all the public buildings and stores,
The tearful parting, the mother kisses her son, the son kisses his mother,
(Loth is the mother to part, yet not a word does she speak to detain him,)
The tumultuous escort, the ranks of policemen preceding, clearing the way,
The unpent enthusiasm, the wild cheers of the crowd for their favorites,
The artillery, the silent cannons bright as gold, drawn along, rumble lightly over the stones,
(Silent cannons, soon to cease your silence,
Soon unlimber’d to begin the red business;)
All the mutter of preparation, all the determin’d arming,
The hospital service, the lint, bandages and medicines,
The women volunteering for nurses, the work begun for in earnest, no mere parade now;
War! an arm’d race is advancing! the welcome for battle, no turning away;
War! be it weeks, months, or years, an arm’d race is advancing to welcome it.
Mannahatta a-march—and it’s O to sing it well!
It’s O for a manly life in the camp.
And the sturdy artillery,
The guns bright as gold, the work for giants, to serve well the guns,
Unlimber them! (no more as the past forty years for salutes for courtesies merely,
Put in something now besides powder and wadding.)
And you lady of ships, you Mannahatta,
Old matron of this proud, friendly, turbulent city,
Often in peace and wealth you were pensive or covertly frown’d amid all your children,
But now you smile with joy exulting old Mannahatta.
EIGHTEEN SIXTY-ONE
Arm’d year—year of the struggle,
No dainty rhymes or sentimental love verses for you terrible year,
Not you as some pale poetling seated at a desk lisping cadenzas piano,
But as a strong man erect, clothed in blue clothes, advancing, carrying a rifle on your shoulder,
With well-gristled body and sunburnt face and hands, with a knife in the belt at your side,
As I heard you shouting loud, your sonorous voice ringing across the continent,
Your masculine voice O year, as rising amid the great cities,
Amid the men of Manhattan I saw you as one of the workmen, the dwellers in Manhattan,
Or with large steps crossing the prairies out of Illinois and Indiana,
Rapidly crossing the West with springy gait and descending the Alleghanies,
Or down from the great lakes or in Pennsylvania, or on deck along the Ohio river,
Or southward along the Tennessee or Cumberland rivers, or at Chattanooga on the mountain top,
Saw I your gait and saw I your sinewy limbs clothed in blue, bearing weapons, robust year,
Heard your determin’d voice launch’d forth again and again,
Year that suddenly sang by the mouths of the round-lipp’d cannon,
I repeat you, hurrying, crashing, sad, distracted year.
BEAT! BEAT! DRUMS!
Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow!
Through the windows-through doors-burst like a ruthless force,
Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation,
Into the school where the scholar is studying;
Leave not the bridegroom quiet—no happiness must he have now with his bride,
Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, ploughing his field or gathering his grain,
So fierce you whirr and pound you drums—so shrill you bugles blow.
Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow!
Over the traffic of cities—over the rumble of wheels in the streets;
Are beds prepared for sleepers at night in the houses? no sleepers must sleep in those beds,
No bargainers’ bargains by day—no brokers or speculators—would they continue?
Would the talkers be talking? would the singer attempt to sing?
Would the lawyer rise in the court to state his case before the judge?
Then rattle quicker, heavier drums—you bugles wilder blow.
Beat! beat! drums!—blow! bugles! blow!
Make no parley—stop for no expostulation,
Mind not the timid—mind not the weeper or prayer,
Mind not the old man beseeching the young man,
Let not the child’s voice be heard, nor the mother’s entreaties,
Make even the trestles to shake the dead where they lie awaiting the hearses,
So strong you thump O terrible drums—so loud you bugles blow.
FROM PAUMANOK STARTING I FLY LIKE A BIRD
From Paumanok starting I fly like a bird,
Around and around to soar to sing the idea of all,
To the north betaking myself to sing there arctic songs,
To Kanada till I absorb Kanada in myself, to Michigan then,
To Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, to sing their songs, (they are inimitable;)
Then to Ohio and Indiana to sing theirs, to Missouri and Kansas and Arkansas to sing theirs,
To Tennessee and Kentucky, to the Carolinas and Georgia to sing theirs,
To Texas and so along up toward California, to roam accepted everywhere;
To sing first, (to the tap of the war-drum if need be,)
The idea of all, of the Western world one and inseparable,
And then the song of each member of these States.
SONG OF THE BANNER AT DAYBREAK
Poet.
O a new song, a free song,
Flapping, flapping, flapping, flapping, by sounds, by voices clearer,
By the wind’s voice and that of the drum,
By the banner’s voice and child’s voice and sea’s voice and father’s voice,
Low on the ground and high in the air,
On the ground where father and child stand,
In the upward air where their eyes turn,
Where the banner at daybreak is flapping.
Words! bookwords! what are you?
Words no more, for hearken and see,
My song is there in the open air, and I must sing,
With the banner and pennant a-flapping.
I’ll weave the chord and twine in,
Man’s desire and babe’s desire, I’ll twine them in, I’ll put in life,
I’ll put the bayonet’s flashing point, I’ll let bullets and slugs whizz,
(As one carrying a symbol and menace far into the future,
Crying with trumpet voi
ce, Arouse and beware! Beware and arouse!)
I’ll pour the verse with streams of blood, full of volition, full of joy.
Then loosen, launch forth, to go and compete,
With the banner and pennant a-flapping.
Pennant.
Come up here, bard, bard,
Come up here, soul, soul,
Come up here, dear little child,
To fly in the clouds and winds with me, and play with the measureless light.
Child.
Father what is that in the sky beckoning to me with long finger?
And what does it say to me all the while?
Father.
Nothing my babe you see in the sky,
And nothing at all to you it says—but look you my babe,
Look at these dazzling things in the houses, and see you the money-shops opening,
And see you the vehicles preparing to crawl along the streets with goods;
These, ah these, how valued and toil’d for these!
How envied by all the earth.
Poet.
Fresh and rosy red the sun is mounting high,
On floats the sea in distant blue careering through its channels,
On floats the wind over the breast of the sea setting in toward land,
The great steady wind from west or west-by-south,
Floating so buoyant with milk-white foam on the waters.
But I am not the sea nor the red sun,
I am not the wind with girlish laughter,
Not the immense wind which strengthens, not the wind which lashes,
Not the spirit that ever lashes its own body to terror and death,
But I am that which unseen comes and sings, sings, sings,
Which babbles in brooks and scoots in showers on the land,
Which the birds know in the woods mornings and evenings,
And the shore-sands know and the hissing wave, and that banner and pennant,
Aloft there flapping and flapping.