Tran, AA
ERH-421
Reflective response
When it comes to poems, it can be assumed that it will either rhyme or be in a structural
format called as a closed form of verse. In Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass, his poems however,
do not rhyme or is considered structured at all. He writes in a free verse form that has no specific
meter and his stanzas are much longer than a classical poem. Although his style was evidently
different, he was able to put emphasis on certain words to create a sharp beat here and there that
would not be as effective if he were to use a closed form verse. In section 11, he starts off using
the word "twenty-eight" in the first three stanzas to emphasize that there are twenty-eight men
bathing by the shore.1This provides a beat and a rhythm between the three lines that rhyming
would make the emphasis on the word twenty-eight less effective. The emphasis is important
because Whitman later describes that there is a twenty ninth bather which turns out to be a
handsome woman fantasizing about bathing with the young men.2 Whitman is also able to sneak
in a metaphor describing how the woman is indeed fantasizing when he say, “Where are you off
to lady? for I see you,”, which he says she stays in her room but he can she her splashing water
with the young men.3 With a closed form verse, there are many requirements such as matching
stanzas that would affect Whitman’s poem in a negative way. Metaphors and certain emphasis
on certain words would not be there.
Walt Whitman. “Song of Myself” section 11. Leaves of Grass and Other Writings. Ed. Michael
Moon. New York, 1965. 34
1
2
3
Ibid,
Ibid,
Reflective Tag
After reading Whitman’s poem, Song of Myself, I definitely look at poetry in a whole new
way. Walt Whitman uses many metaphors that describe the true meaning of his poems in which I
am slowly starting to get better at analyzing. I also learned from the poem that in Walt
Whitman’s day, writing a poem about sexual content was not acceptable and therefore was not
appreciated. As a result he tried to use metaphors to censor the sexual content that he intended.
Therefore, by reading Song of Myself, I no longer think rhyming is required to make a poem
well written, and I learned to analyze Whitman’s poems better to extract its meaning.