Yup. I love 'em. I love words and I love Walt Whitman, whose command of them is impressive. I'm slowly making my way through Leaves of Grass. Very slowly. Anyone who tells you that they breezed through this tome in a few days, a few weeks, or even a few months should be taken down to the local precinct for some serious good cop bad cop. Really, how can you process all those words so easily. They beg to be read, read again and then underlined. O let me be lost if it must be so! I suspect my strongest connection to Whitman is his ever-present connection to death in all its varieties. It's been a problem for me (and my therapist) for some time now. Well, really, more a problem for me than anyone else. I'm a work in progress much like I imagine Whitman was. While I am locked to my responsibilities and try desperately to live in the moment, I think Walt was able to somehow transcend all that bullshit. God bless him for that. Maybe that is just my imagination and he was as torn up as the rest of us. Love, of course, in another theme that runs deep throughout Leaves of Grass. Yup, a good mix of death and love and you've got me. If anyone knew about getting upper, I mean really using words and language in the service of their person and their heart, it was Whitman. Forever alive. Forever forward.