Walt Whitman Memorial,
Nowhere.

project by Riccardo Lopes

Whitman Memorial,
aerial view with the cut in the prairie (sketch).

Whitman Memorial,
transversal section through the cave,
with the grave in the middle.

Whitman Memorial,
plan of the subterranean part,
with the tombal stone in the middle.

Whispers of heavenly death murmur'd I hear,
Labial gossip of night, sibilant chorals
Footstep gently ascending, mystical breezes wafted soft and low,
Ripples of unseen rivers, tides of a current flowing, forever flowing,
(Or is it the plashing of tears? the measureless waters of human tears?)

I see, just see skyward, great cloud-masses,
Mournfully slowly they roll, silently swelling and mixing,
With at times a half-dimm'd sadden'd far-off star,
Appearing and disappearing.

(Some parturition rather, some solemn immortal birth;
On the frontiers to eyes impenetrable,
Some soul is passing over).

Walt Whitman, 1868 - 1871

Where is Whitman now?
Last time I saw him, he was spread with his head rested to South.
He had his eyes sluices that watched towards the frozen North. He was spread on a stone block with carved words.
Words running around all the four sides of the stone, marking a screwed low helicoids.
I listened:
"...whispers of heavenly death murmur'd..."
That was his poem screwed to the earth.
That one I have seen was Whitman’s grave, somewhere in the American prairie, and that grave was like one translation.
One translation from Words to Shapes.
The stone block was in a sunk place, one crack opened in the ground, one fissure of the earth.
It was a seed placed inside earth's womb.
From there inside, closing eyes you can see earth ... sky ... infinity.
"...some parturition rather, some solemn immortal birth..."

Death - Condolences - Painful contractions.
Death is a birth given from earth to heaven.

Riccardo Lopes, 1999