I think I could dash | Whitman Archive

Whitman Archive Title: I think I could dash
Whitman Archive ID: uva.00600
Repository: Catalog of the Walt Whitman Literary Manuscripts at the Clifton Waller Barrett Library of American Literature, Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library, University of Virginia
Box: 1
Folder: 88
Date: Between 1850 and 1855
Genre: poetry
Physical Description: 1 leaf, 4 x 14.5 cm pasted to 4.5 x 15 cm, handwritten
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Content: Whitman probably drafted this manuscript in the early 1850s as he was composing the first (1855) edition of Leaves of Grass . The first line in this manuscript matches a line in the "Talbot Wilson" notebook (loc.00141, recto leaf 38) and is similar in structure to lines that appeared in the first poem in the 1855 edition of Leaves , eventually titled "Song of Myself." The image of the poet navigating stairs also appears in what would become section 44 of "Song of Myself." Draft lines written on the back of this manuscript leaf (uva.00600) may also relate to the poem eventually titled "Song of Myself." Whitman probably drafted this manuscript in the early 1850s as he was composing the first (1855) edition of Leaves of Grass . The manuscript may relate to a passage about touch that appeared in the first poem in that edition, eventually titled "Song of Myself." In his transcription of this manuscript, Richard Maurice Bucke included lines at the beginning and end that read: "Yet I strike and dart through . . . . . . " and "I am a creased and cut sea; the furious wind . . . . . ." ( Notes and Fragments [London, Ontario: A. Talbot & Co., printers, 1899], 34–5). These lines do not currently appear on the manuscript. Draft lines written on the back of this manuscript leaf (uva.00269) relate to lines in the poem eventually titled "Song of Myself."