walt whitman

[rae121452]

i recently retried to read 'leaves of grass' and i still can't slog through it. i get it-he's a seminal american poet, he's the first american queer poet, yadda yadda. i still can't do his poetry.

i actually like poetry. robert service, robert frost, edna st. vincent millay.............i'm all in. but i just can't crack whitman. maybe it's the transcendentalist influence? it all just seems too wordy and disjointed. i've been trying for years to appreciate him...i'm giving up.

 

[pecksniff]

According to one theory, he was not gay at all, just a compulsive masturbator.

 

[WillJ8787]

i recently retried to read 'leaves of grass' and i still can't slog through it. i get it-he's a seminal american poet, he's the first american queer poet, yadda yadda. i still can't do his poetry.

i actually like poetry. robert service, robert frost, edna st. vincent millay.............i'm all in. but i just can't crack whitman. maybe it's the transcendentalist influence? it all just seems too wordy and disjointed. i've been trying for years to appreciate him...i'm giving up.

Small doses at a time should do it.

 

[Dribble]

I think of Whitman like spreading butter right out of the fridge on toast whereas other artists are like spreading butter that is soft. It is still butter. But one sucks cause it doesn't flow

 

[jaF0]

just a compulsive masturbator.

-he's a seminal american poet,

So, he would cum by it on his own?

 

[WillJ8787]

I think of Whitman like spreading butter right out of the fridge on toast whereas other artists are like spreading butter that is soft. It is still butter. But one sucks cause it doesn't flow

Hard butter...lol.

Of old....

Some folks love the Daily Show
Some, The Colbert Report

To each his own.

 

[butters]

i recently retried to read 'leaves of grass' and i still can't slog through it. i get it-he's a seminal american poet, he's the first american queer poet, yadda yadda. i still can't do his poetry.

i actually like poetry. robert service, robert frost, edna st. vincent millay.............i'm all in. but i just can't crack whitman. maybe it's the transcendentalist influence? it all just seems too wordy and disjointed. i've been trying for years to appreciate him...i'm giving up.

his poem 'song of myself' opened a whole new world for me in writing poetry... not such an overall fan of his other works, but that one? it sort of allowed me to permit myself to write some material i'm fairly proud of. Of course, my own stuff fluctuates between absolutely sparse and minimal to lengthy pieces, but i know some of that would never have gotten written without his Song of Myself.

 

[butters]

Hard butter...lol.

Of old....

Some folks love the Daily Show
Some, The Colbert Report

To each his own.

the way imma gonna look at it is whitman as hard butter... not meant to be spread, but to be taken on board in chunks and allowed to melt slowwwwwwwly, ineffably flowing outwards and permeating the crisp brown crusty surface of our psyche.

 

[rae121452]

According to one theory, he was not gay at all, just a compulsive masturbator.

aren't we all.

 

[Stillrandy]

i recently retried to read 'leaves of grass' and i still can't slog through it. i get it-he's a seminal american poet, he's the first american queer poet, yadda yadda. i still can't do his poetry.

i actually like poetry. robert service, robert frost, edna st. vincent millay.............i'm all in. but i just can't crack whitman. maybe it's the transcendentalist influence? it all just seems too wordy and disjointed. i've been trying for years to appreciate him...i'm giving up.

Walt Whitman is notable to me for two things:

1. During the American Civil War, he served as a battlefield nurse, one of the few and first to do so. Acts of extreme mercy.
2. His poem 'O Captain, My Captain' is so evocative of Lincoln, amazing poem.

 

[pecksniff]

AIUI, Whitman is celebrated not so much for the lyrical quality of his poetry as his themes -- hymn to American liberty and vitality.