From Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass--A Parallel Text
by Fredson Bowers published by the University of Chicago Press. Used with permission.

The 'cluster'--to use Whitman's own word--which was to grow into the forty-five poems comprising the "Calamus" section in the 1860 Leaves of Grass began with a much smaller concept and with a different symbolic nexus [than the other poem groups in the collection]. One of the most interesting facts revealed by the Valentine-Barrett manuscripts is that for the major period during the growth of Whitman's plans for the expanded third edition he seems not to have formulated the eventual cluster organization until a very considerable body of miscellaneous poems (at least seventy odd) had already been composed and numbered in order with the new edition in view.

From the analysis of the growth of "Premonition" it has been seen that the pink-paper leaves represent the poems of earliest inscription and that the white wove-paper leaves were a subsequent addition and expansion. Correspondingly, both pink paper and white wove paper from the same stock (as well as one leaf of a blue wove ruled paper and four of the Williamsburg blanks) appear in "Calamus" in circumstances which demonstrate that the white wove paper was employed later than the pink.

The list of poems between no. 33 and no 72 found on the verso of the second pink- paper leaf of "To an Exclusive" numbered 100 (originally 99) checks with similar, revised numbering of numerous poems in the Valentine collection--including extension to no 101 (originally 102) in folder 41--to show that beginning with no.33 and extending though no. 101 a considerable proportion of the poems found collected in the 1860 edition under the sequence- headings "Chants Democratic," Enfans d'Adam, "Calamus," "Leaves," and "Messenger Leaves" were earlier planned and written in an arrangement which had no relation whatever to these 'clusters.' Thus when the cluster idea was evolved as the major organization for the 1860 edition, the earlier conceived order was completely revised, and numerous poems already composed and numbered according to this earliest order were redistributed for inclusion in the clusters, although originally no such connection between them had existed.

In attempting to determine which poems among the Valentine manuscripts were composed from the start as "Calamus" cluster-poems, therefore, we may throw out all "Calamus" poems in the 1860 edition which are found in the Valentine manuscripts written on pink paper. The remainder are chiefly written on white-wove paper, with one on blue wove ruled paper and four on tax blanks. Of those poems inscribed on the white paper, twelve fall readily into a connected roman-numbered series:

MS Poem Number	Folliation	1860 Poem Number	Folder	Paper	Ink
I "Calamus- Leaves"	1	14	16	W1(a)	black
II	2-3	20	21	W1(a)	"
III	4-5	11	13	w1(a)	"
IV	6	23	24	W1(a)	"
V	7, 8, 8 1/2	8	10	W1(a)	"
VI	9	32	34	W1(a)	"
VII	9 1/2, 10	10	12	W1 (a, b)	"
VIII	11-12	9	11	W1(b)	"
IX	13	34	33	W1(b)	"
X	14	43	39	W1(b)	"
XII	16	42	36	W1(b)	"
XII	16	42	36	W1(b)	"

It is clear that these leaves originally formed part of a notebook in which the poems were written on the rectos continuously in the order indicated by their roman numbers. The normal vertical measurement of a full leaf is about 53/4 inches. The part leaves can be fitted together by their contours to reconstruct the notebook as follows:

Notebook Leaf	Poem Number	MS Folliation
1	I	1
2-3	II	2-3
4-5	III	4-5
6	IV	6
7-8	V	7-8
9	V (concluded)	8 1/2
	VI (upper half of MS leaf 9 made from two pasted together pieces)
10	VI (lower half of MS leaf 9)	9
	VII (half-leaf)
11	VII	10
12	VII (concluded: pasted below full leaf above to make up complete MS leaf 10) VIII (half-leaf)
13	VIII	12
14	VIII (concluded: pasted below full leaf to make complete MS leaf 12) iX (half-leaf)
15	X	14
16	XI	15
17	XII	16

By their left margins, furthermore, these leaves can be fitted together to show that the notebook was originally of 20 leaves, made up of 10 conjugate quired folds. The original conjugacy of notebook full leaves 4+17, 5+16, 7+14, 8+13, 9=12, and 10+11 can be established by the contours left by their having been torn apart. Thus leaves 1-3, at present disjunct (w1a), as will be shown later, fitted together with three final blank leaves 18-20 (w1b) to form the complete notebook. A few of the leaves have some signs of paste in the left margin. Moreover, a few small holes in the left margins of the leaves as at the present cut up, and a small piece of white thread still drawn through one of these holes on two leaves, indicate that after the notebook was torn apart the leaves were attached to each other by a form of stabbing.

The alteration in the numbering of MS leaves 91/2 - 13 are not easy to explain. It seems clear that the notebook leaves were not foliated until they were sected in their present form and hence that the altered foliation does not represent an attempt to combine two systems. Leaf 5, for example, has a revising paste-over on its lower half which seems to t have been added after the final leaf was removed from the notebook, but the foliation is on the paste-over and not on the original leaf beneath. Moreover, when the foot of an original notebook leaf does not correspond to the foot of a MS leaf, no sign of numbering is present. Finally, the folio number 16 is added on a disturbed part of the paper and manifestly after the leaf had been torn out of the book. Thus it would seem that Whitman either inadvertently made some mistake which he repaired, or, more likely, that one of the reasons for cutting apart the notebook may have been a plan to rearrange the order, which was subsequently abandoned.*

It seems reasonably clear that in these twelve poems we have the start of the later greatly expanded "Calamus" cluster. In connection with this little series three points may be mentioned.

1. The poems appear to be highly unified and to make up an artistically complete story of attachment, crisis, and renunciation.

2. They are manifestly fair copies, as indicated by the comparative lack of revision which they have undergone as well as by the fact that a draft for number III (then headed V) is preserved on the verso of one of the white-paper additions to "Premonition." The pen and ink of all twelve poems appears to be the same, and there seems every reason to believe that they were copied out fair from lost drafts at substantially the same time.*

3. The calamus symbol is nowhere mentioned in these poems, which instead, in no. I but especially on no. II, refer to the oak. It is significant in the extreme that the early heading for the series was "Live Oak with Moss and that "Calamus-Leaves was substituted at a later date.

Among the "Calamus" poems as printed in 1860 there were eight additional in the Valentine manuscripts which were inscribed on white wove paper of the same stock as that utilized for the twelve in the roman-numbered series. Of these, no.30 (folder 35) represents the conjugate half of leaf 2 of the notebook and thus must have been blank leaf 19; and nos. 44 and 38 (folder 30 + 37) were written on conjugate half of leaf 3 and represent notebook leaf 18. The poems on both of these leaves are written in a light to medium brown ink. Because of the same general size of leaf, it would be tempting to assign no. 37 (folder 31) as perhaps the missing leaf 20 of the notebook though its torn margin forbids demonstration as one of its final revisions is made up from the top piece of W1(b) paper and is written in the same ink as the poems on notebook leaves 18 and 19 makes it certain that no. 37 is, instead, from some unidentified pack of paper. No. 37 is written in a black ink.

Of the remaining five poems, two and a portion of a third are inscribed on pieces of white wove paper (W2) measuring approximately 61/4 inches vertically. These are written in light to medium brown ink and comprise no. 1 (folder 7), the first two leaves of no. 2 (folder 7), and the four leaves in quired folds of no.4 (folder 8). Of these, the two leaves beginning no.2 cannot be identified as connected with any other of the white paper in the Valentine manuscripts, but no. 1 and 4, totaling five leaves, come from one large sheet of white wove paper measuring 15 3/4 x 12 « inches which had been folded and torn to make eight leaves in all. If we reconstruct this sheet by imaging it placed with its longest edge of 153/4 inches horizontally, the leaves will be in vertical position, the upper row reading from left to right (1) leaf 1 of "Chants Democratic" no. 14 "To Poets to Come" (folder 50); (2) leaf 2, conjugate with leaf 1; (3) "Enfans d'Adam" no.1 (folder 7); and in the bottom row (5) through (8) leaves 4, 1, 3, 2 of "Calamus" no. 4 (folder 8). These are all written in the same ink and apparently with the same pen except for "Leaves- Droppings" which seems to be identical with that used to inscribe the white-paper leaves of "Calamus" no.2 (first two leaves), the small paste-on of no. 18 (folder 20) and the W1(b) leaves taken from leaves 18-19 of the "Calamus" notebook (nos. 44, 38, and 39). In addition, this same pen and ink seems to have inscribed the two white leaves of"Nearing Departure" entitled in 1860 "To My Soul" (folder 79), although this paper cannot be connected with other pieces of the white wove stock. Because these last leaves also measure 6 1/4 inches vertically, it seems possible that they were part of another sheet of paper, separately torn into leaves like the reconstructed sheet above, and that beginning "Calamus" no. 2 very likely came from the same sheet, although they were apparently not in any adjacent position--or at least from a similar sheet.

Three poems now remain. These are written on larger pieces of the white wove paper which represent a quarter of the original large sheet. The first is what seems to have been, rather curiously, the original no.2 (folder 7) before the two smaller leaves of W2 paper were prefixed. This is the poem written, after cutting apart, on the back of the sheet which had originally contained the draft of the Brooklyn Waterworks editorial. The second is no. 12 "To a New Personal Admirer" (folder 14) on paper that cannot be connected with other pieces. Finally there is no. 18 (folder 20), written in much the same ink on the back of an early draft for "Enfans d'Adam" no.1. This leaf fits sideways to "Enfans d'Adam no. 9, the interesting "Once I Passed through a Populous City" poem, itself written on the back of a draft for sec. 23 of "Premonition," to make up a half-sheet (w W3).

Of the remaining white wove paper in the Valentine manuscripts the laves in "Premonition" do not join with each other or with other pieces, nor can the two leaves of "Enfans d'Adam" no.8 (folder 4) be identified as originally adjacent to other leaves. Paste-on slip no. 8 of "So Long" seems to be the top of a W1(b) leaf, part of the leaf 20 of the "Live-Oak" notebook, and it is written in the same ink as the leaves in folder 8. The white paper in "Poem of Joys" cannot be identified.

When on the slim evidence available we attempt to place in some approximate order the inscription of the various poems on this white-wove paper, it seems clear on the evidence of the ink that the later additions on the blank notebook leaves (nos. 44, 38, 39) coincide substantially with the inscription of the poems on W2 paper measuring 61/4 vertically, and therefore that the writing-out of roman-numbered poems I-XII preceded the copying of these other poems on W2 paper. It also seems clear on the evidence of the draft for "Enfans d'Adam" no. 1 on the verso of "Calamus" no. 18 (originally part of the same sheet as the leaf of "Enfans d'Adam" no.1 was written, and doubtless the rest of the poems on leaves from the same sheet, preceded the inscription of "Calamus" no. 18 (and its identified conjugate, "Adam" no. 9) on the W3 or quarter-sheet paper as represented by these two poems. *

It is unfortunate that the only poem in "Calamus" that can be darted with any confidence-- that original part of no. 2 written on quarter -sheets containing the draft editorial on the verso-- cannot be linked with other paper. Although the poem begins rather abruptly on the first leaf of the large paper with what is now verse 11, the fact that this leaf was numbered 81 in pencil, almost certainly with an original intent to place the poem in the long numbered series, indicates that the prefixed leaves on W2 paper which now begin the final version were inscribed at a later date. Although the paper of thee two prefixed leaves cannot be physically connected with any of the white leaves, the ink establishes that they were doubtless written-out at substantially the same time as the rest of the W2 paper. However, this fact has no bearing on the important relation between the drafting of that part of no. 2 on the large paper (for it seems definitely to be a first draft, heavily revised) in March or April of 1859 and the inscription of the fair copies of the roman-numbered poems in the notebook.

Nevertheless, it seems plausible to conjecture that the twelve roman-numbered poems preceded this original part of no.2. There is good evidence that the earliest symbol which Whitman adopted for "manly love' was the live oak, its leaves and moss. This symbol is worked out in poems I and II and is given as the original title for the sequence. On the other hand, the original part of No.2 is closely concerned with the calamus leaves as the symbol for male friendship. Slight as the inference may be, it seems reasonable to hold that Whitman did not have these two associations simultaneously in his mind; but that instead the live oak preceded the calamus and was later engulfed by it. If so, the pencil-numbered 81 poem would seem to have been written later than the live-oak series and--as attested by its added number--to have been planned for the inclusion in the long series independent of any cluster. Subsequently, Whitman decided upon the calamus as his basic symbol, altered the heading "Live Oak with Moss" to read "Calamus-Leaves," and in the same ink wrote two 'heading' poems--no. 1 and the prefixed leaves to no. 2 --which performed for the calamus what poems I and II had done for the live oak as an association.*

On the available evidence the dating of the various forms of the white wove paper presents real difficulty. We know that the five leaves of larger paper which comprised the original form of "Calamus" no. 2 must have been written after 16 March 1859, but how soon after is indeterminable. If the date of June, 1859, in the notebook containing the early draft of "Premonition" sec. 23 has any bearing on the verses, as seems probable, it would follow that the intermediate draft on the verso of "Enfans d'Adam" no. 19 would place the inscription of this no. 9 after late June, and with no. 9 we should, on the evidence of the paper, include "Calamus" no. 18. Since the verso of no. 18 contains a draft for "Enfans d'Adam" no. 1, part of a whole sheet of W2 paper can be reconstructed, the various poems on this W2 paper ought to have been inscribed at some indeterminate date before no. 18. From the draft of "Calamus" no. 11 on the verso of leaf 15 of "Premonition" we know that the notebook roman-numbered poems were inscribed as a unit before the insertion of leaf 15 in "Premonition." It seems probable that these two leaves were added after eaves 13, 14, and 16; but whether together or separately is not known. It would seem to be a reasonable inferences, however, that the use of this white wove paper did not extend over a period of many months, and certainly not years. Attention has already been called to the fact that the white-paper additions in"Premonition" sift a calamus fragrance into this poem not found in its earliest form. We may well believe, therefore, that the additions to "Premonition" and the inscription of the white-paper poems later found in "Calamus" and Enfans d'Adam" were made at substantially the same time. If this is so, the inscription of the fair copies of the roman-numbered poems in the notebook was very likely made in the spring of 1859; but since they are fair copies not much can be told about the actual date of composition. The draft of no. III on the back of leaf 15 of "Premonition" is very likely not the first composition. Hence it is as possible that the first form of "Calamus" no. 2 as that no. 2 followed on the notebook. The late spring to early summer of 1859 seems a plausible rough date for both.

However, the fact that no. 2 was, some time after its composition, assigned a number in the long series, and also "Enfans d'Adam" no. 8, as no. 81 and no. 82 respectively, demonstrates that at least as late as April, 1859, Whitman was still thinking in terms of a non-cluster arrangement. The roman-numbered notebook, on the other hand, may seem to represent a modification of his earliest plans and the insertion of one cluster somewhere in the long series, this cluster being confined to twelve poems.* The question then arises whether before the whole batch of Valentine manuscripts was turned over to Rome Brothers this plan was revised and a larger cluster planned. The inscription of "Calamus" no.1 and the significant prefixed new leaves to no. 2 with the inscription of nos. 38, 39, and 44 on what had been the two blank leaves of the notebook, and the inscription of no. 4--to which we may add "Enfans d'Adam" no. 9 addressed in the manuscript to a man--seem to be coincidental with the alteration of the heading of notebook poem no. I from "Live Oak with Moss" to "Calamus-Leaves." This alteration is certainly significant, for without various of the additional poems "Calamus-Leaves" would have no point attached merely to poems I-XII. It would seem, then, that before sending his manuscripts to be set up in proof, Whitman had determined to expand his first idea for a cluster, had changed its basic symbolism, brought over no. 81 from the long series and revised it, and added to the sequence the poems mentioned above.* If this is so, there is every reason to suppose that no. 18 should also be added to this list. No. 12 is less certain, since it is the single titled poem on the white paper and seems, as a consequence, not to have been written with the sequence in mind. Whether the foliation, either original or revised, found on the leaves of some of these poems refers to a separate organization or to their inclusion in the expanded series cannot be determined.*

Of the remaining Valentine-Barrett poems found printed in "Calamus" in 1860, those on pink paper are all titled and numbered in the long series and thus cannot have been composed for the purposes of the cluster. Of the three poems on the backs of tax blanks, no. 27 (folder 27) is also titled and numbered in the long series and is therefore manifestly a revision of some earlier pink- paper poem. A second, no. 15 (folder 17), is not numbered but is entitled "Confession Drops." The title is rather against the theory that it was inscribed or revised for the purposes of the "Calamus" cluster. The third, no. 7 (folder 9), has neither title nor number: possibly it was revised for insertion in "Calamus" from some pink-paper poem, but evidence is lacking. No. 40 (folder 40) on ruled blue wove paper, without title or number, is equally ambiguous. We cannot know whether just before he gave the manuscripts to Rome Brothers Whitman abstracted these poems, including those on pink paper, from their series and arranged them under the "Calamus- Leaves" heading. My own feeling is that this was performed later, in proof, but the single evidence that can be offered is the inscription of white-paper no. 12 with a title which seems to dissociate it from the "Calamus" cluster though it was later printed as a part of the expanded grouping.

If we may take it as a general rule that poems printed in 1860 but not found in the Valentine collection or Rome printed list represent composition, or at least final inscription,* after the date when the manuscripts were turned over for setting up into proof, then it is possible that the nine poems in the 1860 printed "Calamus" section not preserved in manuscript are pieces composed or written-out in final form at a date subsequent to the release of the manuscripts and thus that they may be assigned to the second half of 1859 or to early 1860. *

Although it seems clear that before he sent off the manuscripts Whitman had designed a "Calamus" cluster of about twenty odd poems, no evidence exists to suggest that the 1860 groupings of "Chants Democratic" or "Messenger Leaves" had been evolved at this time.

The case is less certain for "Enfans d'Adam." What was no. 1 in this group was demonstrably inscribed at the same time as the other poems on the reconstructed sheet of W2 paper, and is known in draft before the inscription of "Calamus" no. 18. It is, therefore intimately associated in point of time with the expansion of the "Calamus" cluster; but its subject sets it off from "Calamus" and its heading "Leaves-Droppings" sounds rather as if it were intended as the head-title for a sequence.*

From two of Whitman's notes we know that at some indeterminate time after the writing of the twelve notebook poems he was meditating a balancing cluster on the subject of the love of women. The first was clearly written before the expansion of the original "Live Oaks" poems into a modified "Calamus" sequence:

A string of Poems, (short, etc.) Embodying the amative love of woman--the
same as Live Oak Leaves do the passion of friendship for man.*

Theory of a Cluster of Poems the same to the passion of Woman-Love as the
Calamus-Leaves are to adhesiveness, manly love.  Full of animal fire, tender,
burning.__. . ..Adam, as a central figure and type.*