Walt Whitman Essay
By Julia A. Keirns
Walt Whitman took one of the most mundane ordinary everyday experiences of his life, crossing the river on the ferry to go home at the end of the day, and wrote about it. While pondering this simple experience, he realized all of the wonderful moments and details of it. The flow of the water, the warmth of the sun, the unimportant other people around him, the birds in the sky and even the railing on the boat. He brought all of these details into his life and shared not only the impact they have had on his life, but the impact they will have on the lives of everyone who crosses this river on this boat. At first, he seems to be alone, but then he realizes that he has something in common with all these other people – they too, cross the ferry every day. They too see these things the same as him, yet maybe differently than he sees them. Eventually he realizes that he in the past, has something in common with even the people of the future who will cross this river on this boat one day.
As a writer myself, this particular poem makes me realize that I am never without topics to write about. Right now, sitting in the dark alone in my living room, I see the glow of the string of white Christmas lights around the bookshelf shining and giving off a soft glow in the room. Yes, I always have strings of lights on in my home. I like the soft glow of those lights much better than the harsh light of a lightbulb in a lamp. How easy it would be to create a wonderful poem about the glow from this string of lights.
I have never read this piece by Whitman before. I struggle sometimes with poems like these. I usually just read it through quickly, not understanding much of it at all. Then I always have to go back and read it slowly, sometimes line by line, and figure out the meaning. Then when I go back the third time and read it through quickly again, I understand so much more of it because I have taken the time to understand the meaning of all the little details of it.
Sometimes, I think, for a writer, there is not always a purpose at first. I myself, just love to write, and will write about anything that comes into my mind. The life of the writing changes as it is written and sometimes it ends up with a totally different purpose and meaning than when it was first thought of. When an idea hits, like Whitman, just crossing the ferry every day, it doesn’t necessarily begin with a purpose. I think, more times than not, the purpose for the writing is created as the writing is birthed and nurtured and written. The writer changes it as he writes it. He goes back and edits it a hundred times until finally its’ purpose is complete. So that, in the end, Whitman realized that he was not truly alone on the ferry, and the people around him were not really strangers at all. They all had something in common. And not only does he discover that he has something in common with these strangers on the boat with him, but he has something in common with all the people who ride this boat, and even those who have not been born yet. He understood that his writing would be read by people in the future and they would know what he meant as they too crossed on the ferry.