The Furious Spinner

I sing the body electric.

Did you happen to see American Experience last night? Two hours of Walt Whitman. It was so beautiful. Much of the time, I sat listening with tears in my eyes. (It'll be replayed tonight in many places, but you can watch it online here.)

A few weeks ago, Mario wrote on his blog about the one book he has from his childhood. (The Devil's Dictionary.) I don't really have any books from my childhood. But I've always had a copy of Emily Dickinson's poems in one form or another since I was a girl. And I do still have my Leaves of Grass from college. (Yes, the Norton Edition you see in that link.) I guess that's my one book from almost-childhood.

Have you read Leaves of Grass? I was surprised to learn last night that Mario hadn't read any Whitman. So we're going to start reading Leaves of Grass outloud to one another several nights a week. First we're going to do the first edition, which had just 12 poems in it. Then we'll read the final edition—I think it was the seventh edition—with hundreds of poems in it.

Whitman is a divine fecund wonder. He celebrates himself, he celebrates our bodies, love, the land. His poetry is often ecstatic. It was unlike anything else that was being written at the time. The first Leaves of Grass sold about 20 copies. Can you imagine?

He was a witness to history. He visited tens of thousands of wounded soldiers. Saw Lincoln almost every day during that time. The Civil War broke him, as it broke this country. He was never the same. He had thought that Leaves of Grass could save his country, could prevent war. It didn't. It couldn't. Can any book, any words, any speech prevent war once men are determined to go down that road? I often struggle to figure out what story I can tell, what words I can write down, to save us all. Is it hubris to think that is possible, or just idealistic and unrealistic?

If you haven't read Walt Whitman, I encourage you to do so, especially Song of Myself.

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