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(2018
midterm assignment) Sample Student Midterm Answers 2018 #2a: Short Essay (Passage) (index) |
LITR 4328 |
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Cynthia Cleveland
Whitman’s Sacred Body
“The man’s body is sacred and the woman’s body is sacred,
No matter who it is, it is sacred—is it the meanest one in the laborers’ gang?
Is it one of the dull-faced immigrants just landed on the wharf?
Each belongs here or anywhere just as much as the well-off, just as much as
you,
Each has his or her place in the procession. “ --Walt Whitman, “I Sing the Body
Electric”
Walt Whitman’s poem “I Sing the Body
Electric” is a meditation and celebration of the human body. Throughout the
poem, Whitman describes a multitude of people, every one of them different and
engaged in various activities. There is a distinct appreciation of beauty of the
human form in Whitman’s poem as he describes seemingly mundane observations,
characterizations and activities as something which inspires awe. This is all to
emphasize how different we humans can be while also being, in effect, all the
same when all of that excess is stripped away.
In this particular passage, we get to
the heart of Whitman’s poem: “The man’s body is sacred and the woman’s body is
sacred,”, in this instance Whitman is appreciating the entirety of the human
form. In the beginning of his poem, he relates to us common characters you would
expect to see of the time period, but then further pushes to discuss the issue
of bodily commodification and dismissal of the “other” in this stanza.
Particularly, this poem deals with the issue of slavery in which the body is
commodified in the most literal sense. The purpose, then of this passage is to
enlighten the reader that we are all made of the same substances of the universe
and carefully crafted by nature in the same way. Thus, the body is sacred, not
the body of any specific person, but of all people, regardless of gender, race,
religion or ethnicity. This is evidenced in his lines “No matter who it is, it
is sacred—is it the meanest one in the laborers’ gang? / Is it one of the
dull-faced immigrants just landed on the wharf?”
Going further Whitman makes a grand
statement: “Each belongs here or anywhere just as much as the well-off, just as
much as you, / Each has his or her place in the procession.” Here we can see
that Whitman is arriving at his truth in the poem, that all persons have a place
and purpose in the world, regardless of the boundaries that we have set for
ourselves, whether we separate ourselves by gender, class, race, religion, etc.
There is none more entitled than the other to the freedoms and bounties that
life has the offer. Furthermore, he urges us to reconsider these notions, those
walls that we have built up between one another, and to see that we are all at
our core human beings; capable of the same thoughts and feelings, the same
predilections and fancies, we are simply wrapped in varying packaging and our
fortunes are merely chance.
Whitman also employs a particularly
unique style, his use of free verse, which makes this readable for anyone and
gives a sense of inclusivity, which relates to the overall theme of the poem.
Thus, we can see how Whitman has cleverly pulled us in to his poem, making it
easy to read and share these different perspectives and characteristics, all of
which we can recognize as inherently human and worthy of appreciation. We have
all at one point or another experienced a variation of these trials and emotions
displayed, and it creates a relatable experience. He then pushes us into a
conflict in which we are faced with an awful truth: that we are all the same,
but we do not treat each other as such. This is the type of poetry that retains
its value, as we are historically driven and tempted to enact prejudices against
one another, despite this universal truth that Whitman presents us with. And
this poem is a reminder to set those prejudices aside and see that in the end,
we are all people and that the body is sacred and should be treated as such.
