Wishful Walt

After straining my eyes and sifting through pages of obscure cursive, I managed to make out several key ideas and thoughts regarding the late Walt Whitman. He was considering a dialogue between him and Abraham Lincoln, the “president-elect” in the first couple pages of the document. He also mentions liberation, ships, and oceans (from what I could legibly read). He speaks of a Ship of Liberty and how it crashes against the waves. It is my belief that the ship of Liberty represents America and its fight against corruption and foreign threats. Yet is stays afloat, riding along the sea of time, carrying its patriots to continuous freedom through and through. Whitman was writing all of this around the time America was splitting in two, and the nation looked up to its brand new president for fresh ideas and an end to the breakup. Maybe the ship is the president, and the president is capable of restoring the
“harmony” of the “world” that is the Union and Confederacy.

After reading a thorough analysis on the documents, I found out he was indeed planning to write an imaginary conversation between himself and the president. Whitman also tried to depict the Civil War as a four sided version of God, one that included Satan which represented the Confederacy’s fight and rebellion. He used the Spanish word “libertad” to make clear that freedom was boundless and America was not the only one entitled to it. President Lincoln was also depicted as a captain of a ship, sailing over a now tumultuous sea that represented America. We get a glimpse of Whitman’s thoughts and personality by his ideas resembling those of a man in the midst of his midlife crisis, gentle yet also fiercely trying to stand out in the world. He also drank heavily, clouding up his mind and represented America’s feelings towards the war as well. We even see his portraits and caricature drawn most likely from some bar buddies during one of his nights out drinking.