WITTY WHITMAN 

When I first started to look through the journal, I though that Whitman was just a crazy old man. Everything was scribbled with no organization, with fragments and scribbles filling the pages. (Honestly trying to decipher what he was saying stressed me out because of how messy it was). However, as I read throughout the pages, I noticed a reoccurring theme of a ship. 

Pages nine and ten were both filled with references to a ship. The first on page nine translated (I think) to "ship of liberty". On page ten, "ship of the world, ship of humanity, ship of the ages, ship that circles the world, ship of the hope of the world, ship of promise." 

At first I had no idea what ship he may have been referring to; however, on page 5 Whitman had scribbled out the words, "Old England". This may be connected to his reoccurring idea of a ship. It could represent the transition of people from Europe to America and how the trip represented a new chance for many of the people. His use of words with positive connotations, such as liberty, hope, humanity, and promise, imply that this ship is a good thing. 

I also connected his final drawing, the floating heart with a skull head over the ocean, to the idea of a ship. The heart represents the positive ideas that Whitman had been associating with the ship; however, the skull head and the swords piercing though the heart imply that while the ship represented hope and humanity, somewhere along the line, something went wrong. Since many of his drawing look similar to him, I think that the "failure" of the ship may have been a personal experience. 

After reading the notes on Whitman's journal, I  realized that I was a bit off on my initial observation. While the ship was important, it was not an actual ship; rather, it was  a symbol of America. I was also wrong on the time period of the ship, it was during the Civil War not the before the Revolutionary War. However, I was right that there was a problem with the ship. America was supposed to represent all of these positive ideals, but instead, it was falling apart as the North and South grew discontent with one another. The ship is a perfect metaphor for this because it requires a balance to stay afloat and when the waves become rough it can sink if the crew is not careful. Most fascinating is that Whitman was predicting the effects of the Civil War long before Abraham Lincoln. I think it is interesting how his photos depicted a man that  looked similar to him but his notes (more like scribbles) were poetic predictions. However, as the ship is a symbol of America, America's struggles may have been a larger metaphor for the struggles that Whitman had experienced personally.