Walt Whitman’s younger brother George Washington Whitman, Wounded the Battle of Fredericksburg
Over the Carnage Rose Prophetic a Voice published in 1865 was one of the major poems in the Drum-Taps cluster of poems documenting the Civil War in America. This moment in American history was devastating and paradigm shifting, a realization and idea that Whitman delves into in many of the poems in this cluster. Many of them are full of questions and contradictions marking the inner confusion and tumult that Whitman underwent in having to restructure his glorified view of America, while watching it decline into a tireless war. The poem Over the Carnage Rose Prophetic a Voice shows a hopeful optimism, though written in retrospect. It acts almost as a calming agent, reassuring that the ideal America is not totally lost as a result of this war.
Whitman tweaks the usual motif of rebirth, to one of restructuring in the title of this poem using “over the carnage rose…” rather than “out of the carnage rose.” The classic image that the latter evokes, that is avoided in this case, is that of a phoenix rising from the ashes. A classic archetype used in the aftermath of war for rebuilding a nation. Peculiarly, Whitman decided to reject that image for one that does not denote the America that was. The effects of the war clearly jostled Whitman and his image of America, however that image wasn’t entirely tainted. Whitman is trying to explain that America will return to its former glory in one way or another. He states, “To Michigan, Florida perfumes shall tenderly come, / Not the perfumes of flowers, but sweeter, and wafted beyond death” (449) essentially creating a ‘what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger’ mentality surrounding the future of the country. He is saying here, that America will return to this immortal glory that Whitman was so infatuated with before the war. The optimism and hope in this poem contradicts many of his others as Whitman doesn’t sound all that disheartened by the war. In his eyes it seems as though the country doesn’t need to be totally reimagined, just restored or reconstructed.
Whitman as well comments on the optimism surrounding the Civil War as a turning point for all of American society in this restructuring. He is calling for the changing temperature around human interaction and decency saying that “it shall be customary in the houses and streets to see manly affection,” and calling for liberty, love and equality. Here Whitman shows his eagerness for change and acceptance of the aspects of his life that he continuously wrestles with like his lack of homonormativity that he attempts to mask in much of his other works. However, this optimism sounds almost too excited, bending toward naïve, given the circumstance and historical context. The country is fresh out of the civil war, and still rife with animosity and strife and is still almost entirely disjointed. It seems simple to immediately call for love and comradery when the smoke has just barely cleared.
This isn’t to say that Hope is unimportant. There is a clear sense of relief in this poem due to the war’s end and relief often times breads excitement. Whitman goes on to say that he is in fact “ecstatic” about the prospects of the rebuilt country. The way that he recommends for us to get there, at the very end of the poem, is the love and comradery that previously seemed idealistic. That, Whitman explains, will “tie you and band you stronger than hoops of iron” (449). He recognizes the need for change citing that lawyers, agreements on paper and by arms are systems of the past and real cohesion is from something deeper than a document. This is an interesting way to end this poem given Whitman’s influence by the founding fathers. The last few stanzas act as a patriotic call to arms, something the men he idolized were no stranger to. However, he is simultaneously rejecting their model of doing so, further supporting his theories to rebuild the country with some choice changes rather than reimagining it entirely.
The photo above is of “George Washington Whitman, the poets’s younger brother, was wounded in the Battle of Fredericksburg in December 1862. Walt Whitman rushed to his brother’s side, thus beginning three years of tending the wounded.” (Murray)
https://whitmanarchive.org/criticism/current/anc.00156.html
I definitely agree that the tone of the poem seems almost too optimistic, to the point of being naive, especially when compared with some of the other poems that we read from Drum Taps. Poems like “The Wound Dresser” and “The Artilleryman’s Vision” give us such depressing and graphic depictions of the war, and “Year That Trembled and Reel’d Beneath Me” makes it clear that the events of the war have had a profoundly negative impact on Whitman, and then stuck there near the end is this prophetic vision of hope. Although, Whitman does acknowledge the “carnage” of the war in the title, so it’s not like the poem taken as a whole is truly naive. Also, the emphasis on brotherhood and human connection seems especially pertinent to me, considering that during the war it was “brothers fighting brothers”. Whitman definitely imagines that true cohesion cannot be achieved with documents and laws, like you say. True power comes from love: “Those who love each other shall become invincible” (449).