【美国人物志】沃尔特·惠特曼 (4/8)

英语自学网

沃尔特·惠特曼（英语：Walter Whitman，1819年5月31日－1892年3月26日），美国诗人、散文家、新闻工作者及人文主义者。
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American Civil War
Walt Whitman
Washington, D.C
President Abraham Lincoln
"When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed"
ever-returning

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The American Civil War began in 1861. The southern states had withdrawn from the United States. They wanted to protect their rights against the central government. They especially wanted to continue owning black slaves.
The northern states fought the South to save the Union and free the slaves. Walt Whitman hated slavery because he believed all people are equal. He supported the northern cause.
During the war, Whitman worked for the government in Washington, D.C. He also worked without pay at army hospitals. He helped care for wounded and dying soldiers. He sat beside these men for hours. He brought them food. He wrote letters for them.
Whitman sometimes saw President Abraham Lincoln riding his horse in Washington. President Lincoln was murdered soon after the Civil War ended. Whitman honored him with a poem called "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed." The poem describes Lincoln as a great spirit and a fallen star. This is how the poem begins:
When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed.
And the great star early drooped in the western sky in the night.
I mourned, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.
Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring.
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west.
And thought of him I love.
O powerful western fallen star!