Calamus

And that's why a lot of the "Calamus" poems, these kind of homoerotic poems, were reprinted in his own day in these very, very proper Victorian anthologies of Whitman's poetry, like "Gems From Walt Whitman," because he managed in many of his poems to present this this kind of love as sort of a healing kind of comradeship for a nation that, after all, was very riven by racial and economic divisions.

Walt Whitman's America: A Cultural Biography 1996

Late in life on the other hand, when he was approached by John Addington Symonds, who was a European homosexual, and said, "Don't your homoerotic poems" -- the "Calamus" poems -- "don't they sort of imply this sexual relationship between men?"

Walt Whitman's America: A Cultural Biography 1996

And I think that those moments of anguish in some of his poems and certain of his "Calamus" poems, which are sort of his homoerotic poems, have -- like there's one called, "Trickle Drops," in which he describes the drops of blood oozing out of him and so forth and being beaten and so on.

Walt Whitman's America: A Cultural Biography 1996

In this book -- in "Calamus," "Drumtaps," and elsewhere -- Whitman celebrates a friendship in which physical contact and a kind of silent voluptuous emotion are essential elements.

Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 Sexual Inversion Havelock Ellis 1899

That the letter is in hopeless conflict with the 'Calamus' section of poems.

Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 Sexual Inversion Havelock Ellis 1899

That the 'Calamus' part has ever allowed the possibility of such construction as mentioned is terrible.

Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 Sexual Inversion Havelock Ellis 1899

In order to settle the question as to the precise significance of "Calamus," J.A. Symonds wrote to Whitman, frankly posing the question.

Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 Sexual Inversion Havelock Ellis 1899

Besides, important as they are in my purpose as emotional expressions for humanity, the special meaning of the "Calamus" cluster of "Leaves of Grass," (and more or less running through the book, and cropping out in "Drum-Taps,") mainly resides in its political significance.

Collect ; from Complete Poetry and Collected Prose 1855

Besides, important as they are in my purpose as emotional expressions for humanity, the special meaning of the "Calamus" cluster of "Leaves of Grass," (and more or less running through the book, and cropping out in "Drum-Taps,") mainly resides in its political significance.

Complete Prose Works Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy Walt Whitman 1855

Whitman had done in his homoerotic "Calamus" poems-to write lyrical, openly sexual love poems to Russell.

PoetryFoundation.org 2009