Jose Padua. A Highly Speculative Concatenation of Walt Whitman With the Birth of Punk Rock Among Other Things.

A HIGHLY SPECULATIVE CONCATENATION OF WALT WHITMAN WITH THE BIRTH OF PUNK ROCK AMONG OTHER THINGS

Walt Whitman wrote
“I sing the body electric”
but I wonder if he ever
imagined the power
and possibilities of
the electric guitar.
Could he have been
the one who invented it
if only in his mind
without telling anyone
either friend or lover
or man or woman connected
by soil or blood?
Did his inner ear hear
the shredding,
the solos like an Indian raga,
the power chords
and strummed rhythm,
or maybe even the cry baby effects
of the wah-wah pedal?
Just as we see our souls
reflected in Nature,
we hear them too
in the falling of rocks
the bending of trees in a storm
and the ocean’s steady
breathing and humming
that became the measure
of an old blues song.
And in the time
of short nights and
long days was
it Walt Whitman
who in the midst of
a midnight’s body song
first lifted a bottle of
glue to his nose
and breathed in?