Poetry and Prose (Library of America) Book

This time I reread only Leaves of Grass. For me it's a touchstone. I've read it many times, returning to it because I find it comforting and reassuring. Whitman himself explains it very well, in this edition on p512: "Not till the waters refuse to glisten for you and the leaves to rustle for you, do my words refuse to glisten and rustle for you." With muscular language like that combined with his demonstrated largeness of heart and care of everything in the world, his poetry is infectious. Reading him makes me want to swagger outside and bundle up the morning and throw it over my shoulder.

And this time I'm reading only the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass, influenced by the recent critical study by C. K. Williams which convincingly argues that the 1855 edition, the original, was the strongest and that the poetry Whitman added in subsequent years was weaker, therefore weakening the entire book. I'd always read the 1891-92 edition before, apparently believing the more the better, though I do remember reading the 1855 about 10 years ago. I'd forgotten the "Preface." I'd forgotten or had not realized in earlier readings it's poetry, too, a 22-page prose poem as fine as the poetry in stanzaed form which follows. I enjoyed it enormously again and expect to with each reading in my future.

Rereading, 2018. And finished again 5 Jun.

Great is life...and real and mystical...wherever and
whoever,
Great is death.... Sure as life holds all parts together,
death holds all parts together;
Sure as the stars return again after they merge in the light,
death is great as life.