Infinitude And Emotional Recursion In Modernist Poetry

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everything and yet be one single part of that everything, or to be big and small, all and nothing at once is how he perceives his life. He takes on these and other forms to relate this idea to our perceptions.
Whitman continually takes on these massive and all containing ideas in his writing. In section forty-four he relates this idea of the infinite again. He states “We have thus far exhausted trillions of winters and summers, There are trillions ahead, and trillions ahead of them” (Whitman 67). He shows once again that the infinite has been and yet will be once more. Also he tells us that we will determine what that time will be, and in turn that the time will determine what will become of us. “I am an acme of things accomplish’d, and I an encloser of things to be” (Whitman 66). One element determines another, and yet what one determines in turn defines what it came from. The idea of everything being part of everything else and yet containing everything else is the common idea expressed here, and is also how Whitman expresses himself.
Returning to section twenty-four, Whitman goes on to say that he is “Turbulent, fleshy, sensual, eating, drinking and breeding” (41). He shows us that he is made of what would be considered the base human desires and emotions. He is what his emotions define him to be, yet those emotions are defined by what other people perceive. This makes his emotions (his basic definitions of himself) separate elements made up of more emotions in themselves. It is hard to explain, but Whitman goes to his most basic desires and sees the smallest element in himself. However, these smallest elements can be broken down further into the ideas that other people use to define them. Whitman’s emotions are combinations of other peopl...