Happy Birthday, Walt Whitman!

Celebrating the Good Gray Poet on his day

At Walt Whitman’s tomb in Camden, NJ

Today is the birthday of our dear Walt Whitman, born 1819 in West Hills, NY. He’s been such a meaningful character throughout our lives, appearing in unexpected ways with profound and everlasting impact as he has for so many. I wanted to share something special today, a film about Walt I made in 2014 with Eric Hoegemeyer called The Good Gray Poet. I’ve mentioned this film before in previous posts, and today was the day I had wanted to share it with you all. Unfortunately, I was unable to find it. :( It wasn’t on the hard drive I was sure it was living on, and I wasn’t able to get in touch with Eric in time to see if he has a copy. I’m hoping so much that he does or that it appears somewhere else because at the moment I feel a bit nervous and heartsick. I texted a new friend though about my worries last night and he sent this nice message which comforted me, so I wanted to share it with you also:

“it exists somewhere! even if you don’t find it tonight it will show up. and the timing will be right too.”

So as a quick side note (and you know how I love revisiting the topic of missing items and files), if you can’t currently find something, please follow this wonderful and comforting wisdom to help you move forward with peace.

Now back to Walt! I know I can’t share the film with you yet, but I can tell you a bit about it. We originally made it for an installation at Rockaway Beach in 2014. We transformed one of the outbuildings at Fort Tilden into the ‘Walt Whitman Reading Room’ and the film screened there on repeat, broken up by a rotation of several short films we made of my mom reading Walt’s words. The room had tables with books, sheets of blank paper, and plenty of pens and art supplies, inviting guests to read, write, draw, and think. There were several buildings each with installations and exhibits created and curated by different artists. The show was done in partnership with MoMA PS-1 and called Rockaway!

It was around this time that my mom and I started performing Walt’s words of ‘Mannahatta,’ her reading with me on piano. My favorite performance of this was at the Philadelphia Museum of Art for his 200th birthday event in 2019. We were invited to perform and we played several songs, read his words, and did our reading of Mannahatta, though with different music that we hadn’t practiced together. It was one of those moments when we were perfectly in sync, everything flowing in the best and most unexpected way, and we both knew it without exchanging a word or a glance. It was one of my favorite times performing with my mom. I was hoping we had a recording of it to share, but our dear friend Adam who often archives her shows wasn’t there that day, and I couldn’t find a recent contact for the museum. As of today, the performance is only a memory, still alive in both of our minds. I hope, like the film, that a recording turns up somehow, though in the case that it doesn’t, I’m so grateful for the experience and the ability to remember it as clearly as I do.

It was also at that event that I was able to screen our film for the first time since showing it at Rockaway in 2014. It was so special to watch it projected on the wall of this historic art museum, and in celebration of Walt’s 200th birthday. <3

Some more photos from that performance:

---

A funny thing happened the next day. The museum event was on May 30, and the next day May 31, on his actual birthday, there was a celebration of music, poetry, print making, and other activities in the local square. My mom and I joined in the festivities, and there was a plan to have a birthday cake for Walt. I don’t know the gentleman’s name, but they had brought in a Walt ‘impersonator’ who was dressed as him for the duration and acted as him throughout the day. I didn’t vocalize this feeling to anyone, but somehow my brain had decided that it was actually and truly him, and I had a feeling of nervousness around him. I was shy, my heart was racing, I tried to think of something decent to say. It really felt as though Walt Whitman himself was there with us. My brain was unable to separate reality from fantasy, and I didn’t mind at all. It was such a fun feeling and I embraced it fully without actually giving it a real thought. Eventually I shared this with my mom, and she completely had felt the same thing! Maybe we both wanted to be able to have the experience of talking with Walt, maybe somehow this man embraced and embodied his spirit so well that it was transmitting to everyone. Who knows. Either way, it was a sweet experience, and we loved singing Happy Birthday with the locals of Philadelphia, sharing in cake and celebration for his 200th birthday.

---

In April at the NY Antiquarian Book Fair, there were many beautiful editions of Leaves of Grass, as there usually are at book fairs. The original 1855 large size first edition that we all recognize. There was one in particular that was a popular conversation piece, in the $100k+ range. My favorite though was the rare 2nd edition printing from 1856, which has words from Ralph Waldo Emerson on the spine. I saw two examples of it in separate booths at the fair, and Benoit Forgeot showed me his copy up close which I loved seeing. It’s a smaller size edition and on the spine it has goldstamped, 'I Greet You at the / Beginning of A / Great Career / R.W. Emerson.' <3

I love this detail because I love Emerson of course, and also because it shows the connection through time of our dear writers, the way they inform, inspire, and encourage each other, sometimes passing each other in the same timeline, sometimes decades or centuries apart. There are connections and through-lines, ones that are expected and ones that surprise us so much. I love to see examples of these moments, reminders of admiration and the flexible elasticities of time and place. These writers become our friends, our teachers, our supports and comforts, our inspiration and our own sacred brand of encouragement, and why shouldn’t they be?

---

So I can’t show you The Good Gray Poet film today, and I can’t play for you a recording of my mom and I performing Mannahatta, but I can celebrate Walt with you, for the things that he wrote and created, for his words and wisdoms, and we can see his modern and continued influence on writers and artists alike. One of my favorite poets is Fernando Pessoa, and from the voice of his heteronym Alvaro de Campos, he wrote these words for Walt. So many people are inspired by him all over the world, and we continue to sing his words today, 132 since he died. If you are here in NYC, you can visit the block for him at St. John the Divine at Poet’s Corner and light a candle in his honor. If you are in New Jersey, you can visit his grave site in Camden. If you are in NYC there are several locations where he frequented, and even the house where he lived in Brooklyn. If you are by the river or the sea, you can visit there because he loved the water. You can ride the ferry on the the NY Harbor and think of his words about New York. If you are anywhere in the world, you can read his words, any of his words, and say a nice thought for Walt on his birthday. You can write something for him.

I’ll leave you now with some Walt quotes that I looked up. Use them to inspire journaling or free writing today, and share any thoughts as always in the comments. I hope also if you were able to do the exercise from yesterday you can share that too in the comments or the Chat. Looking forward to reading your words and thoughts!

Be curious, not judgmental.

Keep your face always toward the sunshine - and shadows will fall behind you.

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes.

I have learned that to be with those I like is enough.

To me, every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.

I exist as I am, that is enough.

I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars.

Simplicity is the glory of expression.

Have you learned the lessons only of those who admired you, and were tender with you, and stood aside for you? Have you not learned great lessons from those who braced themselves against you, and disputed passage with you?

Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.

After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, conviviality, and so on - have found that none of these finally satisfy, or permanently wear - what remains? Nature remains.

Seeing, hearing, feeling, are miracles, and each part and tag of me is a miracle.

And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

Have you heard that it was good to gain the day? I also say it is good to fall, battles are lost in the same spirit in which they are won.

Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me, why should you not speak to me? And why should I not speak to you?

Henceforth I ask not good fortune. I myself am good fortune.

I celebrate myself, and sing myself.

Happy Birthday, dear Walt Whitman! And happy celebrating to everyone. <3