Song of the Grass

Lately in AP Literature, we’ve been studying poetry, specifically poets who were the founders of Transcendentalism; those poets being Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman. We were assigned as a class to read Whitman’s poem ‘Song of Myself’, which is precisely fifty-two stanzas long. It was a tough read, but very good. I would only recommend this to people who are serious about reading and have the ability to focus entirely on the poem without having to lock themselves in a closet.


Then we were each assigned a stanza to analyze and give a presentation for the next day. My stanza, number six, reads as follows:

VI
A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord, A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt, Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic, And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones, Growing among black folks as among white, Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you curling grass, It may be you transpire from the breasts of young men, It may be if I had known them I would have loved them, It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out of their mothers' laps, And here you are the mothers' laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers, Darker than the colorless beards of old men, Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.

O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues, And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing.

I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women, And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men? And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere, The smallest sprout shows there is really no death, And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it, And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses, And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

In this stanza, Whitman shows us the thoughts that ran through his mind when presented with the question ‘what is grass?”. At first, Whitman feels incapable of answering the child’s question, but ponders over the idea and comes up with multiple ideas the grass could be. The grass grows everywhere, and under everyone. This shows Whitman’s philosophy that everyone is equal.

The main theme for this stanza is one of the key themes for the whole poem ‘Song of Myself’. Stanza six expresses the theme of reveling in the beauty of nature and feeling the connection to it. This theme reoccurs frequently throughout the poem, as it being one of the major themes of transcendentalism.

Whitman gives us several ‘definitions’ of what he thinks grass represents. In line three, he calls it the ‘flag of my disposition.’ I think he is saying that the grass reflects his personality. He also calls it the ‘handkerchief of the Lord, a scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropped.’ A remembrance is a souvenir, or a memento- something to remember God by. Whitman is saying that the grass is from God, and reminds us of God. Another of his ‘definitions’ is a ‘uniform hieroglyphic’, which means an ‘unvarying symbol that is hard to understand.’ Whitman is literally saying that he actually doesn’t know what the grass is; he can’t figure it out. He is saying it could be a multitude of things. And then there is the ‘uncut hair of graves’… This gives us a definite image in our head, but the meaning and symbol behind this phrase is quite interesting. Whitman uses this phrase to imply that the grass grows off and comes from the dead and buried bodies of men. It acts as a ‘sanctuary’ for the deceased.

I want to point out a few lines that really sum the meaning of this stanza up:

What do you think has become of the young and old men? And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere, The smallest sprout shows there is really no death, And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the end to arrest it, And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses, And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

In these lines, many different views can be applied while interpreting. For example, you could interpret that those lines are implying that whenever a blade of grass sprouts out of a grave, that dead person just gave it new life. From the transcendental view, there could be the implied idea of reincarnation. The very last line- ‘and to die is different from what anyone supposed, and luckier’ reiterates the reincarnation belief. Or, from a Christian standpoint, we could conclude that it is talking of going to heaven. But since we know that Whitman was a transcendentalist, we also know that the idea of reincarnation is the most probable interpretation of these lines. Also, in one line, Whitman uses the word perceive, which literally means to become aware through the senses. Transcendentalism is all about experiencing nature through the senses, so I don’t think there could have been a clearer portrayal of transcendentalism.

Like the majority of Whitman’s poems, stanza six portrays the connection between man and nature. In this specific stanza, it conveys the transcendental worldview in a more efficient way than some of Whitman’s other poems. It is clearly speaking of grass, which is obviously part of nature. It also has an implied idea of reincarnation, which is another belief of transcendentalists.

What is reincarnation exactly? It is the belief that the soul, upon the death of the body, comes back to earth in another body or form. Technically, transcendentalists believe in the oversoul pool concept. This is their interpretation of life after death. The model of the oversoul pool is a fountain where souls mix at the bottom and are born again at the top. They believe that a piece of soul will conjoin with all the other pieces of soul to form a new soul. This isn’t exactly reincarnation, but it is closely similar.

Stanza six gives us a decent view into Whitman’s mind- it shows us some of his thoughts and opinions, and it also gives us a good view on his transcendental ideas, all portrayed uniquely in his song of the grass.

And I know that this is my writing blog, but as another part of the assignment we had to bring in an artistic representation of our stanza, so I drew this:

Its a bit hard to see, but its a gravestone in a field of grass.