Focus: Walt Whitman May 31, 1819 March 26,1892

"I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you…"

by: Bea Tan

These first few lines from Walt Whitman's poem "Song to Myself" more or less show Whitman's style in his poems. Simple and personal. He leases part of himself in all his works. Even in his earlier years as a poet he already had a unique personal way of signing his book. Instead of signing his name he used to display a photograph of himself in shirtsleeves and nonchalant pose.

Born on May 31, 1819 at West Hills, Long Island, New York, Walt Whitman was a late bloomer in the poetry world. Although, he already worked as a journalist at the age of 21, his talents were not immediately recognized that it took literary experts almost a decade before they distinguished his work. Whitman himself was the one who first printed his own life's work "Leaves of Grass" through his friends the Rome Brothers in Brooklyn. Less than eight hundred were printed and only two hundred were bound. It was only Ralph Waldo Emerson who first saw the merits in Whitman's words.

The most popular poem of Walt Whitman is "O Captain! My Captain!". It is a poem about Lincoln's death. Almost all of his poems talk of patriotism and democracy, which was probably the reason why he did not succeed as a journalist, because almost all of the newspaper at that time were partisan. "O Captain! My Captain!" is included in the collection of Whitman's work entitled "Leaves of Grass. He devoted most of his life revising and expanding "Leaves of Grass" which is now considered a literary masterpiece. During the Civil War he worked as a volunteer for a military hospital and some years after that he worked in different government agencies. Whitman was a true writer no matter what that even after 1873 wherein he suffered a stroke and spent the rest of his life in Camden, N.J., he still continued to write poems and article until he died on March 26,1892. It was indeed a great loss to the literary world. But to the true followers of Whitman, he never was lost instead he left a legacy. Through his words he remain in the hearts of all those who read his work.

"I bequeathed myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles…."

- Walt Whitman (Leaves of Grass)