Part five of Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself” explicates the intrinsic relationship one shares with his soul. The poet delivers a monologue to his own soul, in which he conveys his union with it. He recollects a metaphorical morning spent with his soul.
The poet opens – in lines one and two – with an acknowledgment of the paramount importance of his soul. He proclaims, “I believe in you my soul, the other I am must not abase itself to you” In lines four to six, the poet proposes to his soul, “Loafe with me on the grass, loose the stop from your throat…” The poet uses this request to convey a heartfelt desire to gain a deeper understanding of himself. He proceeds, “Not words, not music or rhyme I want… Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice,” thereby stressing the pleasure he derives from listening to his own thoughts, spoken through the voice his soul.
The poet continues (in lines seven to eleven) by recalling – or at least fabricating – a past liaison, immediately reminiscent of (presumably homosexual) oral sex; “How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn’d over upon me… And reach’d till you felt my beard, and reach’d till you held my feet.” However, the poet relates the encounter – not merely to depict an overtly sexual act – but to describe the exhilaration he receives from self-discovery. This is evidenced in lines twelve to twenty-two, in which the poet relates what can only be called a euphoria: “Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass / all the argument of the earth… And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women / my sisters and lovers…”Part five of “Song of Myself” is in no way a separate entity; in fact, it’s meaning is deeply entwined with that of the entire work.
The Essay on Letters to a Young Poet
Rilke’s “Letters to a Young Poet,” ostensibly a series of reflections about and advice regarding the inner-life of an accomplished poet, reveal as much about philosophical and moral attitudes as those attitudes or concepts which are commonly associated with literary theory and literary technique. In fact very little, if any, evidence of traditional literary criticism exists ...
For instance, the first part opens with “I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself, / And what I assume you shall assume, / For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.” This is paralleled in the final stanza of part five, in which the poet states “…And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own, / And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own, / And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women / my sisters and lovers,” in the sense that it reiterates the thematic idea of a higher unity, in which everything and everyone is connected. In a similar vein, the usage of sexual metaphor is not unique to the fifth part. In part eleven, the poet discusses a voyeuristic scene: “Dancing and laughing along the beach came the twenty-ninth / bather, / The rest did not see her, but she saw them and loved them. / The beards of the young men glisten’d with wet, it ran from their / long hair, / Little streams pass’d all over their bodies.”Bibliography:Whitman, Walt. “Song of Myself.”
