Section 52 of Whitman's "Song of Myself" is written, like
the rest of the poem, in free verse. There is no rhyme and no fixed meter (rhythm),
although it is interesting to note that many of the lines have between 12 and 15
syllables.
Whitman uses a wide variety of poetic
devices.
a) Onomotopea (words that mimic a sound): "my
barbaric yawp."
b) Anthropomorphism
(inaminate objects are described as if they are
human:
the day
"coaxes me to the vapor and the
dusk."
c) Anaphora (the
repetition of phrases or grammatical structures):
readability="10">
I too
am not a bit tamed, I too
am untranslatable
I
depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway
sun,
I effuse my flesh in
eddies
The theme of this
section of the poem is the poet's view of his death and his future life after death. The
poet does not fear death. Rather, he sees it as a return to nature, from which he
came:
I
bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I
love.
The poet predicts that
he will simply become part of the dust that the reader will find "under you
boot-soles." Although he will be hard to find, the poet predicts that he will bring
"good health" to the world.
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