Content:
On two leaves of pink paper, both 21 x 13 cm, in black ink, with minor revisions
in the same ink. Pinholes mostly in center and at top of both pages. This poem
became section 21 of "Calamus"
in 1860; the lines on the first manuscript page became verses 1-6, and those on
the second ("I hear not the volumes of/ sound merely—...") became 7-9. Retitled
"That Music Always Round
Me" in 1867, it was transferred in 1871 to the "Whispers of Heavenly Death"
cluster in
Passage to India.
In
1881 Whitman incorporated it, with the rest of the cluster, in the main body of
Leaves
.
Content:
On one light blue Williamsburgh tax blank (21.5 x 12 cm), in dark brown ink, with
revisions in fine pen and pencil. Whitman penciled in a question mark, in
parentheses, next to the title. With the addition of the new first line "O love!"
this became section 27 of "Calamus" in 1860. In the 1867
Leaves
it was retitled "O
Living Always—Always Dying!" Whitman next transferred it to the "Passage to India" supplement
bound in with
Leaves
, where it
reappeared in 1876; in the 1881
Leaves
Whitman permanently added it to the cluster "Whispers of Heavenly Death."
