The Theme of Death in Whitman’s Poetry

Every poet worth the name, gives a distinguishing place to the theme of death in his poetry. Not only that, it is by the importance given to the theme of death, one can understand the poet’s outlook of life. Walt Whitman, who is praised as the “Organic Voice” of America, portrays death as the “Strong Deliveress” which offers deliverance to human beings and he also personifies death, calling her as a “dark mother.”

No doubt, the death of Abraham Lincoln moved the poet’s heart. In the suffering and death of his dear leader the poet’s anguished heart experienced the suffering and death of so many soldiers he had himself witnessed. That’s why says Spillar, “In giving his love to his dear leader, he gave it to mankind.”

In his well known poem “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d,” Whitman invites death in this way:

“Come lovely and soothing death,
Undulate round the world serenely arriving, arriving,
In the day, in the night, to all, to each,
Sooner or later delicate death.”

Thus he realizes the universal significance and necessity of death. The poet, therefore, glorifies death and sings joyously the song of death. After realizing the mystic truth behind death, the poet dances with joy and he salutes to death and he adorns death with his carols of joy.

The mystical insight which he acquired through this elegy is that he could rise above his personal grief for his beloved hero and could visualise the thousands of soldiers who had suffered and died in the Civil War. So, at the end of the poem the poet becomes aware of all human tragedy and realizes that those who were killed in the Civil War are fully at rest, while it is their surviving relatives and friends who suffer. The following lines lessen the intensity of the poet’s grief:

“But I  saw they were not as was thought,
The living remain’d and suffer’d, the mother suffer’d,
And the wife and the child and the musing comrade suffer’d,
And the armies that remain’d suffer’d.”

In the poem “Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking,” which is considered as the best poem of Walt Whitman by many critics, Whitman’s mystic experience can be compared to that of sage Valmiki. The pathetic story of the two birds changed the “Outsetting bard” into a “Chanter of pains and joys,” “uniter of here and hereafter, “who continued his singing of joys and sorrows, life and death throughout his life. The “key” or “clew” which is offered to the bird is really the “clew” which Whitman attains through his mystic experience. In the beginning as a boy Whitman bewildered and could not understand the real significance of the he-bird’s pathetic song of love and death. At last it was the sea mother, the old crone offered her help and made him understand the secret of death. The sea mother provides him with the “clew,” the “delicious word” – ­“Death.”

Whereto answering, the sea,
Delaying not, hurrying not,
Whisper’d to me through the night, and very plainly before day break,
Lisp’d to me through the night, and delicious word,
And again death, death, death, death……..
Creeping thence steadily upto my ears and loving me softly all over,
Death, death, death, death, death.”

Whitman realizes that it was only “Death” which was the cause of the two birds’ disunion.

In Whitman’s famous poem “Song of Myself” the poet comes to the conclusion that our life is not all chaos or death. Death is not the end of life, but the beginning of life. Life is eternal. Behind this Universe there is an organized plan. The divine plan ensures eternal life and happiness. So, one has to be ready to invite death joyfully and to receive it peacefully. Death offers new breath to human life.

See, hot calmly Whitman utters, with great contentment,
“It is not chaos or death – it is form, union,
plan – it is eternal life, it is Happiness.”

For the poet death is loving, soothing and giver of peace and serenity. It relieves people from burdens and bandages of human life and enriches them with perfection and purity. Nobody can escape from death. So we should welcome death as our friend, which gives us new life. This is the message of Walt Whitman to humanity.

Whitman overjoys when he gains “insight” into the real nature of death as a result of his mystical journey. He realizes the mystic truth – “The eternity of life.” He is not afraid of death. This is so because he has realized the mystic truth that death is not the end of life. Rather it is a birth into eternal life. What is called life is “But the leaving of many deaths.”

Whitman is not only a poet of rebellion, but also a poet of cheerful optimism. A zest for life characterizes all his utterance. Such is his optimism that he conceives of death itself, not as an end, but as a rebirth into a better life.