In Whitman's “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer,” he paints a verbal picture of appreciating learning from experience. In lines one and two, he inundates you with heavy words like proofs, figures, charts, and diagrams that are all very strong and authoritively describing his learning experience in a lecture room. He grows "tired" and "sick" of this sense of confinement. Feeling captive and stagnant in this conventional learning environment, he longs to, instead of just reading the facts and charts about the stars, be outside to freely observe these things for himself. Finally using much lighter words such as "rising" and "gliding "and then "perfect silence", he is describing the relief and feelings of freedom of finally escaping the lecture
