Walt Whitman Archives - The Libertarian Labyrinth

Emma Goldman, “Walt Whitman” (incomplete manuscript)

August 18, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] WALT WHITMAN Last summer I listened to the reading of a very fine paper on Walt Whitman, at the Public Library of the city. I was struck by what seem[ed] to me a futile attempt on the part of some of the men who participated in the discussion to contrast Walt Whitman with some European poets. Not that Whitman was the greatest of all times or all nations. I even think some of his biographers have rendered the poet of Leaves of Grass scant services when they proclaimed him greater than Homer and Socrates. The […]

Emma Goldman, “Walt Whitman”

July 6, 2017 Shawn P. Wilbur

[two_third padding=”0 10px 0 0px”] The poet of Leaves of Grass is a true son of American soil and yet very un-American. So long as he sings the song of the wonders of nature, the beauties of the unlimited resources, old Walt feels part and parcel of the strength of Mother Earth, but our great poet becomes un-American when he arraigns the Puritanic interference which has paralyzed life to such an extent as to make it barren. In fact, Walt Whitman may be called the iconoclast of Puritanism. No other writer or poet in America has so thoroughly exposed the […]

Walt Whitman, “A Woman Waits for Me” (“Poem of Procreation”)

May 15, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur

[Among the references in Emma Goldman’s writings on sex, Walt Whitman is undoubtedly key. His poem, “A Woman Waits for Me,” is referenced at the end of “The Element of Sex in Life.”] A woman waits for me, she contains all, nothing is lacking, Yet all were lacking if sex were lacking, or if the moisture of the right man were lacking. Sex contains all, bodies, souls, Meanings, proofs, purities, delicacies, results, promulgations, Songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk, All hopes, benefactions, bestowals, all the passions, loves, beauties, delights of the earth, All the governments, judges, […]

One’s-self/En-masse

September 9, 2008 Shawn P. Wilbur

“One’s-self I Sing,” by Walt Whitman ONE’S-SELF I sing—a simple, separate Person;Yet utter the word Democratic, the word En-masse. Of Physiology from top to toe I sing;Not physiognomy alone, nor brain alone, is worthy for the muse—I say theForm complete is worthier far;The Female equally with the male I sing. Of Life immense in passion, pulse, and power,Cheerful—for freest action form’d, under the laws divine,The Modern Man I sing.