Walt Whitman’s PoetrySome Approaches

Anaphora: the repetition of the same word or words across successive phrases, clauses, or sentences.From “Song of Myself,” section 6:

It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men,

It may be if I had known them I would have loved them,

It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out of their

mothers’ laps.

• From “Song of Myself,” section 15:

And these tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them,

And such as it is to be of these more or less I am,

And of these one and all I weave the song of myself.

Apostrophe: an address to someone or something not present

“O Captain! My Captain!”

From “Song of Myself,” section 51:

Listener up there! What have you to confide in me?

• From “To The States”:

Resist much, obey little…

• “To You”:

Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me?

And why should I not speak to you?

Turnaround Lines

From “Poet To Come”:

I am a man who, sauntering along without fully stopping,

turns a casual look upon you and then averts

his face…

(That’s all one line of verse, but it does not fit in the margins.)

Free Verse: poetry of varying line lengths and no set meter or rhyme

Almost all of Walt Whitman’s poetry!

Topics and Themes

Nonconformity

Topics and Themes

Nonconformity

Embracing the common

Topics and Themes

Nonconformity

Embracing the common

Love of America and democracy