I am thinking of you a great deal in this lovely September weather, wondering how it is with you, dreaming of that September eight years ago when you were here. In another month I suppose we shall have the two books the "N.B."2 and the "C.W."3 Before that time or soon after it I may see you—all looks well for the meter4 so far and I may be east a good deal looking after it. I wonder how it is we (at least, I) hear nothing these times of Kennedy5 and his "Walt Whitman." I fear publishers are not smiling upon him—fifty years from now loc_es.00323.jpg they would be glad enough to get it. I am hard at work on a paper or pamphlet or something or other on the same subject but goodness knows when it will see type—however nothing like pegging away—our turn will come some time I suppose since "every dog has his day"
Let me hear from you when you feel up to it—it seems a long time since I saw your handwriting or the envelope of a letter
We are all well and we all send love to you
I am always affectionately yours RM Bucke loc_es.00320.jpg See notes Sept 5, '88 loc_es.00321.jpgCorrespondent:
Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902) was a
Canadian physician and psychiatrist who grew close to Whitman after reading Leaves of Grass in 1867 (and later memorizing it) and
meeting the poet in Camden a decade later. Even before meeting Whitman, Bucke
claimed in 1872 that a reading of Leaves of Grass led him
to experience "cosmic consciousness" and an overwhelming sense of epiphany.
Bucke became the poet's first biographer with Walt
Whitman (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1883), and he later served as one
of his medical advisors and literary executors. For more on the relationship of
Bucke and Whitman, see Howard Nelson, "Bucke, Richard Maurice," Walt Whitman: An
Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York:
Garland Publishing, 1998).