by Whitman · Cluster: Stars · Night · Military Camp
Abstract
Wearied by the lecturer’s charts, the poet wanders out to look in silence at the stars; a free-verse lyric contrasting dry science with mystical wonder, on stars, night and nature.
Connections
Motifs: Stars, Night, Silence Themes & Concepts: Wonder and Gratitude, Nature vs Civilization Forms & Genres: Free Verse, Lyric
Testo integrale / Full text
Cluster: BY THE ROADSIDE
When I heard the learn’d astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much
applause in the lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.