Whitman's Got Wit, Man

One of my favorite strophes from Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” is number fourteen. It reminded me a bit of “To a Waterfowl,” by William Cullen Bryant. I like the appeals to nature that Whitman makes in this strophe. The image of wild geese flying through a cool night struck me as refreshing, almost relaxed, which was then contrasted by the “sharp-hoof’d moose of the north” in the next stanza. I can imagine geese squawking when Whitman uses the onomatopoeia: “Ya-honk.” Whitman uses multiple comparisons in this strophe, his first coming just after the onomatopoeia: “and sounds it down to me like an invitation.”

Whitman also uses repetition of noises in this strophe. He uses alliteration like “find its purpose and place up there” and “as they tug at her teats,” as well as ending repetition in his line “What is commonest, cheapest, nearest, easiest, is Me.”

What I like most about this strophe, again, is the appeals to nature. I love how Whitman chose to listen closely to the gander to “find its purpose and place up there toward the wintry sky.” I like how chose a wide range of animals to represent the nature that he loves. From a huge moose to a tiny chickadee, Whitman observes nature and puts it into his work.

Another strophe I like is number seventeen. One reason (but not the main reason) I like this strophe is that it is pretty short. There are not many words in terms of length, but there are also not very many different words used. Whitman employs anaphora in this strophe, repeating phrases in the beginning of lines. He doesn’t just use one phrase to repeat, but he chooses three phrases and uses them at different points in the strophe. These repetitions show a sequence in the strophe and make the words more powerful.