![]() ![]() In this section, Whitman records the physicality of singing, of speaking a poem: a poem, he reminds us, does not derive from the mind or the soul but from the body. It is in this literal act of breathing that we gain our “inspiration,” the actual breathing in of the world. ![]() We are always tempted to live our lives according to the views of those who came before us, but Whitman urges us to escape such enclosures, open up the senses fully, and breathe the undistilled atmosphere itself. They are all “intoxicating”-alluring, to be sure, but also toxic. In one of his early notebooks, Whitman had drafted the line “Literature is full of perfumes,” a recognition that books and philosophies and religions all offer filtered versions of how to view the world. In this section, Whitman breaks out of enclosures, whether they be physical enclosures or mental ones. ![]()
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