America

On my trip yesterday, we passed these people waving the American flag and one or two POW MIA flags as well from an overpass to honor what occurred on Sept 11th. It looked like they’d been enduring the rain all day which was especially hard at this spot in Virginia for a while. One of them was a firefighter in full gear and I couldn’t distinguish the rest, but I felt this Whitman poem was especially appropriate.

“I HEAR America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be
blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves
off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the
deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter
singing as he stands
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the
morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at
work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to no one else,
The day what belongs the day- at night the part of
young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.”

All of my quotes are from the poems in Walt Whitman “Poetry and Prose” ISBN # 1-883011-35-3. I don’t feel like doing a real citation for my own blog.

On my trip yesterday, we passed these people waving the American flag and one or two POW MIA flags as well from an overpass to honor what occurred on Sept 11th. It looked like they’d been enduring the rain all day which was especially hard at this spot in Virginia for a while. One of them was a firefighter in full gear and I couldn’t distinguish the rest, but I felt this Whitman poem was especially appropriate.

“I HEAR America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be
blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves
off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the
deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter
singing as he stands
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the
morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at
work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to no one else,
The day what belongs the day- at night the part of
young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.”

All of my quotes are from the poems in Walt Whitman “Poetry and Prose” ISBN # 1-883011-35-3. I don’t feel like doing a real citation for my own blog.

On my trip yesterday, we passed these people waving the American flag and one or two POW MIA flags as well from an overpass to honor what occurred on Sept 11th. It looked like they’d been enduring the rain all day which was especially hard at this spot in Virginia for a while. One of them was a firefighter in full gear and I couldn’t distinguish the rest, but I felt this Whitman poem was especially appropriate.

“I HEAR America singing, the varied carols I hear,
Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be
blithe and strong,
The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,
The mason singing his as he makes ready for work, or leaves
off work,
The boatman singing what belongs to him in his boat, the
deckhand singing on the steamboat deck,
The shoemaker singing as he sits on his bench, the hatter
singing as he stands
The wood-cutter’s song, the ploughboy’s on his way in the
morning, or at noon intermission or at sundown,
The delicious singing of the mother, or of the young wife at
work, or of the girl sewing or washing,
Each singing what belongs to him or her and to no one else,
The day what belongs the day- at night the part of
young fellows, robust, friendly,
Singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.”

All of my quotes are from the poems in Walt Whitman “Poetry and Prose” ISBN # 1-883011-35-3. I don’t feel like doing a real citation for my own blog.

Yesterday I drove from Collingswood, NJ where I live down to Durham, NC to take a look around. In January I’ll be moving here which is going to be the first time I’ve lived anywhere outside a close proximity to where I grew up. 

I love traveling. I’ve made a goal for myself within the next year where my father is going to come with me on a cross country road trip to see as much as possible of the lower 48 states. I’m determined to see as much of my own country as possible before leaving it again. This trip is so terribly important to me I can’t really describe its weight right now.

But aside from all that. Yesterday, driving down 95 I began to think of how Whitman would have viewed all this. Our massive highway system that sprawls across the country, with automobiles among other technologies that allow us to travel great distances in such short periods of time. I took a look through ‘Song of the Open Road’ to see what I’d find as the title seemed appropriate.

Big surprise, ‘Song of the Open Road’ isn’t so much about about the journey but the relationships forged from it. He demands the very best of his companions and shows his moralistic code in Stanza 10:

“He traveling with me needs the best blood, threws, endurance / None may come to the trial till he or she bring courage and health/ Come not here if you have already spent the best of yourself/ No diseas’d person, no rum-drinker, or veneral taint is permitted here”

Without those relationships it doesn’t appear Whitman would be all that interested in the journey, and not only relationships with people but with the earth too. He even made me feel a little bit better about traveling the highway system in stanza 4:

“O public road, I say back I am not afraid to leave you, yet I love you, / You express me better than I can express myself, / You shall be more to me than my poem”

Recalling what I saw yesterday I realized that the spirit that America and the possibilities of America still remain the same. I can remember seeing the sun dip into the Neuse River Basin last night cutting through Virginia and North Carolina on Highway I-85 and smelling the pine trees around me. Looks like I get my own chance at the open road.

All of my quotes are from the poems in Walt Whitman “Poetry and Prose” ISBN # 1-883011-35-3. I don’t feel like doing a real citation for my own blog.

Yesterday I drove from Collingswood, NJ where I live down to Durham, NC to take a look around. In January I’ll be moving here which is going to be the first time I’ve lived anywhere outside a close proximity to where I grew up. 

I love traveling. I’ve made a goal for myself within the next year where my father is going to come with me on a cross country road trip to see as much as possible of the lower 48 states. I’m determined to see as much of my own country as possible before leaving it again. This trip is so terribly important to me I can’t really describe its weight right now.

But aside from all that. Yesterday, driving down 95 I began to think of how Whitman would have viewed all this. Our massive highway system that sprawls across the country, with automobiles among other technologies that allow us to travel great distances in such short periods of time. I took a look through ‘Song of the Open Road’ to see what I’d find as the title seemed appropriate.

Big surprise, ‘Song of the Open Road’ isn’t so much about about the journey but the relationships forged from it. He demands the very best of his companions and shows his moralistic code in Stanza 10:

“He traveling with me needs the best blood, threws, endurance / None may come to the trial till he or she bring courage and health/ Come not here if you have already spent the best of yourself/ No diseas’d person, no rum-drinker, or veneral taint is permitted here”

Without those relationships it doesn’t appear Whitman would be all that interested in the journey, and not only relationships with people but with the earth too. He even made me feel a little bit better about traveling the highway system in stanza 4:

“O public road, I say back I am not afraid to leave you, yet I love you, / You express me better than I can express myself, / You shall be more to me than my poem”

Recalling what I saw yesterday I realized that the spirit that America and the possibilities of America still remain the same. I can remember seeing the sun dip into the Neuse River Basin last night cutting through Virginia and North Carolina on Highway I-85 and smelling the pine trees around me. Looks like I get my own chance at the open road.

All of my quotes are from the poems in Walt Whitman “Poetry and Prose” ISBN # 1-883011-35-3. I don’t feel like doing a real citation for my own blog.

Yesterday I drove from Collingswood, NJ where I live down to Durham, NC to take a look around. In January I’ll be moving here which is going to be the first time I’ve lived anywhere outside a close proximity to where I grew up. 

I love traveling. I’ve made a goal for myself within the next year where my father is going to come with me on a cross country road trip to see as much as possible of the lower 48 states. I’m determined to see as much of my own country as possible before leaving it again. This trip is so terribly important to me I can’t really describe its weight right now.

But aside from all that. Yesterday, driving down 95 I began to think of how Whitman would have viewed all this. Our massive highway system that sprawls across the country, with automobiles among other technologies that allow us to travel great distances in such short periods of time. I took a look through ‘Song of the Open Road’ to see what I’d find as the title seemed appropriate.

Big surprise, ‘Song of the Open Road’ isn’t so much about about the journey but the relationships forged from it. He demands the very best of his companions and shows his moralistic code in Stanza 10:

“He traveling with me needs the best blood, threws, endurance / None may come to the trial till he or she bring courage and health/ Come not here if you have already spent the best of yourself/ No diseas’d person, no rum-drinker, or veneral taint is permitted here”

Without those relationships it doesn’t appear Whitman would be all that interested in the journey, and not only relationships with people but with the earth too. He even made me feel a little bit better about traveling the highway system in stanza 4:

“O public road, I say back I am not afraid to leave you, yet I love you, / You express me better than I can express myself, / You shall be more to me than my poem”

Recalling what I saw yesterday I realized that the spirit that America and the possibilities of America still remain the same. I can remember seeing the sun dip into the Neuse River Basin last night cutting through Virginia and North Carolina on Highway I-85 and smelling the pine trees around me. Looks like I get my own chance at the open road.

All of my quotes are from the poems in Walt Whitman “Poetry and Prose” ISBN # 1-883011-35-3. I don’t feel like doing a real citation for my own blog.