Walt Whitman's Song Of Myself

Walt Whitman is widely recognized as one of America’s leading nature poets. His wide-ranging description of the “voluptuous coolbreathed earth” (“Song of Myself” line 439) in his lyrical works suggests both the poet’s respect for the natural world and his transcendentalist belief in the world’s unity in diversity. Whitman comes to a more complete and fulfilling grasp of his humanity through the various poetic discourses evident in his poetry. The first concerns a discourse between the internal self and the external physical world, as is particularly the case in “There Was A Child Went Forth” (1871) and “Song of Myself” (1881). The second dialogue elaborates the connection between the self and the spirits of life and death, which is one of the most significant themes in “Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking” (1859). …show more content…
“Leaves of Grass” (1855) is in many ways the extensive celebration of a large, democratic self that corresponds with the vastness of the American continent. However, Whitman’s evocative choice of title relates his book to nature by way of a distinctly small life form: a “spear of grass” (“Song of Myself” line 5), a powerful reminder that his poetry, for all its continental aspirations, was centrally concerned with nature’s minutest aspects. The poet was focused on nature’s connection with the particular consciousness of all human beings, employing the smallest natural phenomena as reflections of the cosmic human self. This establishes the interconnection of the body and the soul through the “kosmos” (“Song of Myself” line 498), which Whitman describes as a concept that “includes all, the whole universe” (Reynolds 246). By establishing the