Ralph Also Emerson was a trailblazer. His views on nature, existentialism, poetry, and human sexuality expressed within his poetry were unprecedented for his time. Many poets tried to follow in his footsteps, but none succeeded quite like Walt Whitman. Similar to a relay race, Whitman took Emerson’s thoughts and ran with them. While separately, these poets were powerful, together they created a movement unlike any other.
Scholars agree that Walt Whitman was inspired by Ralph Waldo Emerson’s stated need for an American poet. He saw America as a large, unsung poem; just waiting to be written. Emerson beckoned the call, a call that would later greatly inspire Walt Whitman, in his essay “The Poet”: “Our log-rolling, our stumps and their politics,
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Whitman thought that sexuality should be embraced rather than ignored, we should celebrate all of our urges whether they be straight or gay. He wanted us to love our bodies and be fascinated by our anatomy and natural sex appeal. While Whitman’s writings can be very erotic and express sexual desires, but they rarely discuss specific acts of sex. His passages more so talk about the sensuality of the body and mind. In “Song of Myself” he wrote: The atmosphere is not a perfume . . . . it has no taste of the distillation . . . . it is odorless, It is for my mouth forever . . . . I am in love with it, I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked, I am mad for it to be in contact with me. The smoke of my own breath, echoes, ripples, and buzzed whispers . . . . love root, silk thread, crotch and vine.” Whitman has also written about his love for men as well, not necessarily sexually; but sensually. While there is no doubt that Emerson probably felt the same way (it has been rumored that he had quite a few “homo-erotic” feelings), he just did not vocalize his feelings in the same manner that Whitman