Whitman’s Poetics in the Select Leaves of Grass

ABSTRACT: This qualitative research investigates the poetics in the select poems of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass and focuses on the following aspects: (1) imagery in content signification; and (2) symbolic transaction for universal freedom. Qualitative method of pure descriptive discourse analysis of the poetic language in the chosen poems is used in this research. The study reveals that (1) the poetic imagery is produced by the senses of sight, touch, taste, and sound; and (2) the persona in the select poems is a muted man speaking his right for universal freedom to his fellow oppressed and the oppressors. Furthermore, it has been found that Whitman’s select poems in the Leaves of Grass are written with a lot of imagery types and most of these are images of sight, touch, sound, and taste which are sensual that metaphorically extend the meaning of universal freedom. Furthermore, this collection of poems is an anthology of celebrations of nature, of the individual, of freedom and the kinship of all humanity. The study concludes that the poems in Whitman’s Leaves of Grass reveal the imagery in content signification and symbolic transaction for universal freedom.
Keywords: Poetics, imagery, symbolic transaction, content signification, and universal freedom, humanity