Anthem to the Unique Body and its Iterations in Leaves of Grass

Abstract

The current study examines body and its iterations through the lens of New Criticism. Beside defeating the requirements of poetic metrication, Leaves of Grass (LoG) appears, through ten of the poems it contains, as a praise song to human body. Elements related to the author’s biography have been overlooked at the expenses of the literary genius displayed in the artistic portrayal of the profoundness of the Ideal Man substantiating all the bodies. The narrator has assigned to any body characteristics amounting to perfection. Every living thing and body are testimonies of the greatness of the Creator whose creation is unmastered, perfect in some extent, and revealers of Him. The human body has been dealt with as a collection of wonders. Therefore, this work revisits LoG from a constant appeal to lust and sensuality as some criticism perceived it to a eulogy of human body beyond colors and sexes making this study a claim that practices like racism and sexism are negations of the divine wonders embedded in Colored people and in Women.