Just Brilliant

Pretty funny thought: most of us probably came home today and were bummed out that Mr. Tangen had left us homework; read Walt Whitman. We probably thought it was going to be some absurd writer who probably didn’t do much in his life, a man that stayed in his basement and just wrote poems. Ridiculous I might suggest, and I choose the word ridiculous not only for its definition but simply because it just sounds right, ridiculous. As I read Walt Whitman on my 2-by-2 desk, sitting in front of my computer, eyes instinctively attached to the screen, immediately after reading the first few words, “I CELEBRATE myself;” (LoG; W.W.) Genius. Who would have ever thought that a poem writer would have the courage to begin his montage of poems in this manner, just brilliant. Or could it be a mock-like gesture? The audacity to appraise himself in that manner. I think that he not only represents “style” on so many different levels, he is the embodiment of what each writer should strive for, originality. He then proceeds in this manner, “And what I assume you shall assume; (LoG;W.W.) I gazed for a while, and began to think that the repetition was radiantly calling for attention and that’s what I focused on when reading, “what I assume you shall assume.” Speechless. It’s almost as if Whitman planned to do this, almost as if he juxtaposed these words so that they left the reader in admiration. Or could it be coincidence? Naaa, it couldn’t be. Or? Maybe, it was Withman’s wittiness that actually got something right. Whichever it may happen to be is unclear to me, I will never figure this out. So I did the obvious, turned my Ipod off, logged out of Facebook, closed my laptop shut, slowly sealed my eyes with my eye lids, and went to sleep.