Calamus 26 We two boys together clinging
This is one of the gayest of the Calamus poems, a fantasy of two men against the world, full of life and ardor. I should be all over this in my gay reading!
Instead I see a darker form of Americanism here. "Power enjoying ... Armed and fearless ... No law less than ourselves". It's classic American individualism fantasy, a repudiation of community and law. Armed, at that.
On top of that I trip over the "North and South" part every time I read this. In 1860 when this was published we were just steps away from a Civil War after 10 years of enormous tension. I don't blame Whitman for wanting unity, his whole program in Leaves of Grass is American unity. All I can think is how there's no moral equivalence between the North and South. But Whitman wasn't an abolitionist and this poem reflects that.
Sorry for not reveling in the gay, maybe it's the ICE and California National Guard news affecting my reading today.
Warum ich bei der Klimakrise keine Hoffnung mehr habe? Weil das Wort Kapitalismus nicht mal mehr erwähnt wird.
Was soll das?
https://www.instagram.com/p/DKR8nWlRtZi/
Calamus 25 The prairie-grass dividing
Whitman's celebration of simple men, of men from "inland America", of those who are unimpressed by Presidents and Governors. It's a romantic sentiment but in 2025 also feels a little naïve or condescending.
But as always I'm here for the gay stuff. Which starts explicitly enough
[I] Demand the most copious and close companionship of men
Well OK then! Me too. Maybe you could read that in a non-sexual way but then Whitman gets lusty
[I demand] Those with a never-quell'd audacity—those with sweet and lusty flesh, clear of taint, choice and chary of its love-power
My goodness, is that hot! At least to start, it's a shame he tames it seeking out men "chary of love-power". At least he recognizes their love power! I'll take the taint, thank you.
Warum ich bei der Klimakrise keine Hoffnung mehr habe? Weil das Wort Kapitalismus nicht mal mehr erwähnt wird.
Was soll das?
https://www.instagram.com/p/DKR8nWlRtZi/
Calamus 24 I hear it is charged against me
This poem feels just so typically Whitman, but lesser somehow. Not one of my favorites.
He says he is "charged that I seek to destroy institutions". Charged by whom, one wonders, is he really so important? He sort of denies this, or is ambivalent to it, and then gets to the queer part:
I will establish ... the institution of the dear love of comrades
And here we are again at the central queer question: just what does he mean by "dear love of comrades"? As I read these poems I'm increasingly thinking it's both things. Sure, it's brotherly love, adhesiveness, a sort of robust fraternity. But so much of his writing and life is homoerotic it has to also have that charge. It can be both.
I feel like I've heard that phrase "the institution of the dear love of comrades" repeated often.
Calamus 23 This moment as I sit alone
A promise of global unity, Whitman sharing his adulation for men in other countries.
I guess this is an antidote to Whitman's nationalism? His celebrations of America seem sweet and sincere but they are very American-centric. Here he's explicitly saying men of other lands can be just as wise, beautiful, or benevolent as American men. It seems unusual that he feels he has to say it explicitly.
As for the queer reading, his conclusion is
I know we should be brethren and lovers
There's that word, "lovers". It's so brash it's hard to understand. It seems uncharacteristically direct even understanding Whitman as a gay poet. Maybe this is some 19th century romantic language, mixing what feels very gay in with a more general celebration of brotherhood? Or maybe it is literally what it says, Whitman eroticizing international men.
Calamus 21 Music always round me
A celebration of life, the metaphor of music all around us if only you can hear it. The last line is what gives me pause, it suggests an interesting nuance of meaning.
I do not think the performers know themselves—But now I think I begin to know them.
I'm a little pressed to find a gay reading of this poem, it doesn't have the usual paeans to manly love. There is a pleasant exuberance and sensuality to it, "shuddering luciously" and all. But it's the beginning lines that really catch me:
Music always round me ... yet long untaught I did not hear,
But now the chorus I hear, and am elated,
It's like there's a secret world of pleasure that Whitman only recently has learned to enjoy himself. A feeling similar to the epiphany of coming out to oneself.
Calamus 20 I saw in Louisiana a live-oak growing
What a heartaching poem of loneliness and the need for the love of another! Just wonderful. I understand now why this poem is so popular, particularly as a gay poem. It is full of meaning and is quite clear about it.
I wondered how it could utter joyous leaves, standing alone there, without its friend, its lover near—for I knew I could not
There's a more cerebral interpretation of this work, particularly if you understand "leaves" to mean "pages in my poetry book Leaves of Grass". Whitman talking about his own poetic inspiration from lovers.
Which well enough. But I'm more interested in Whitman's expressed need for "manly love". Which is clearly on his mind constantly:
my own dear friends ... I believe lately I think of little else than of them
Also Whitman's own eroticization of nature and himself. Here speaking of the tree,
its look, rude, unbending, lusty, made me think of myself