The close reading of diction: Reading of diction: Whitman's “To a Locomotive in Winter”

Surname
Course
Lecturer
Date
Reading of diction: Whitman's "To a Locomotive in Winter"
This paper seeks to give an interpretation of the Whitman's "To a Locomotive in Winter". The poem is about a locomotive described as very powerful and strong in an optimistic manner. From an in-depth understanding of this poem, the speaker supports the progress of technology in the United States of America. This is shown by the representation of the locomotive as the speaker attempts to ascertain a connection between science and poetry. In a more interpretive way, Whitman's poem links science and poetry in a particular way with few negative undertones. Looking closely, the speaker shows some connotations indicating fear of the future fortune.
Whitman's "To a Locomotive in Winter" poem illustrates the beauty and strength of a train: "Thy golden brass and silvery steel, black cylindric body / Thy parallel and connecting rods, ponderous side-bars, shuttling at thy sides gyrating" (Whitman 677). A close interpretation indicates that the imagery of the poem is a combination of beauty and strength: "Thy floating vapor-pennants, pale, long, tinged with delicate purple/ Thy great protruding head-light fix'd in front," (Whitman 677). In this stance, different sections of the train are indicated, the great strength and the delicate beauty combined. Both of the two parts of the train come all together in order to establish train's motion: "Through calm or gale, now slack, now swift, yet steadily careering; / modern type - emblem of power and motion -the continent pulse," (Whitman 677). In an interpretation, the shown images create a theme of the parts of the train that work together to establish power, movement, and beauty, which Whitman develops even in other poems.
Whitman has also used a lot of personification within the poem. This means that most parts of the poem illustrate its meaning via inference. Primarily, Whitman's poem, "To a Locomotive in Winter" illustrates perseverance and firmness of the locomotive. Due to the personification used in the poem such as "'Thy piercing, madly-whistled laughter" is perceptibly a human character trait, therefore, Whitman compares a determined and strong-spirited human being to the locomotive. Strong-spirited and determined in such a way that the individual will consistently pursue life goals and push through even all the way during the hard-hitti...