"O Captain! My Captain!"

I've had a few different interpretation of this poem this week. Don't get me wrong, I like this poem. I enjoy the rhyming scheme that Whitman employs here, thought it gives me a whimsical connotation when I read through it. In fact, if you read it and had no idea it was written about Lincoln, you may think, like I do, that it could be about a captain of a ship. 

The truth is Lincoln was the captain of a ship - our nation is a great big ship--tossing back in forth between the waves. The opening of this poem says, "O Captain! My Captain! our fearful trip is done / The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won / The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting / While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring."  I like these opening lines. I looked up the word exulting because I just wasn't sure exactly what Whitman was trying to get at. I think he means to glorify. If Lincoln wouldn't have been assassinated would we view him the same way we do today? How would the reconstruction of our nation have gone with him at the helm? as opposed to how it actually went? I think we tend to put people on pedestals because we want to believe in someone. I hope Lincoln was everything Whitman thinks he was. 

I have found that if I read this poem slowly, I get a more serious tone from it. I try to picture Whitman standing in front of a crowd, reading it himself. I can feel the emotion when he says, "The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done / From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won." I know we won the war, but there would still be battles to fight. Nothing is ever really done.

This particular poem of Whitman's was not written in the usual way. Whitman went with they rhyming and the general public enjoyed it. I don't think Whitman should badly about having success with a poem that wasn't in his usual form. I think the important part was getting his message out there--which he did--successfully. I am glad that Whitman wrote this poem. It shows me that he can write poetry in many different ways. I feel that as a writer he was willing to explore what he didn't like--and I think that's good. I think we have to try to stay open-minded, and I think Whitman of all people would want an open-minded reader.