Taxi Ride

In Rankine’s “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely” there is an amazing mix of prose, poetry, images, and dialogue that feels similar to Lerner’s 10:04 in many ways. Unlike Lerner, there is no direct reference to Whitman yet there are still many instances of Whitman’s energies. The mention of New York City always seems to be somewhat Whitmanic. There are points of crisis like September 11^th and there are attempts at recovery like the capture of Hussein. However, all of “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely” feels washed with a sense of depression, hopelessness and lack of human connection. On page 89, Rankine refers to a ride in a taxi when she feels as though she captures what causes loneliness.  I do not think the idea of loneliness is not something that Whitman addresses directly, I feel as though because loneliness is essentially the opposite of human connection these ideas are closely related.

Rankine says “I let my thoughts drift below the surface of the Hudson until it finally occurs to me that feelings fill the gaps created by the indirectness of experience. Though the experience is social, thoughts carry it into a singular space and it is this that causes the feelings of loneliness; or it is this that collides the feeling with the experience so that what is left is the solitude called loneliness.”

The idea that our minds and thoughts keep us from having genuine human connection is really interesting. I have never thought about how often I can actually isolate myself by being so deep into my own thoughts but it actually happens very often. The fact that this thought is followed by a fairly intimate conversation with the taxi driver makes this even more interesting. I feel as if the conversation with the taxi driver is a very Whitmanic example of human connection even though it is introduced by a bleak idea of loneliness. The way that Rankine plays with ideas of human connection is very thought-provoking throughout “Don’t Let Me Be Lonely.” Although she looks at the world through a different filter than Whitman, I feel as though they are addressing very similar ideas.