# As Consequent, etc. explained — Leaves of Grass

> Chapter companion for Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman.

## What happens

The poet sings of songs born from the natural world—rains, rivers, and subterranean streams—flowing through America's diverse landscapes toward the mystic ocean of death and eternity. He addresses the reader, declaring that all currents of life and time converge, blending the solid and liquid, the peaceful and ominous. The chapter closes with an offering of small, voiceless shells from the sea of Time, which carry faint, eternal music for the soul of the West and America's shores.

## Themes in this chapter

### Celebration of Nature and the Universe

The chapter is built on natural imagery—rains, rivulets, canyons, snow, and ocean—depicting the universe's flowing currents.

### Death and Immortality

Life's rapids blend with old streams of death, and the mystic ocean represents eternity; the shells carry 'eternity's music.'

### America and Its People

The poem traverses American geography (Ohio, Colorado, Oregon, Texas, Erie, Niagara) and addresses the reader as part of the nation.

## Character check-ins

### Narrator

The speaker who sings of continued years and gathers currents from nature and time.

### America

The continent and nation whose shores receive the waifs and tidings from the deep.

### Death

The old streams of death into which life's rapids soon blend.

## Key lines

> Songs of continued years I sing. Life’s ever-modern rapids first, (soon, soon to blend, With the old streams of death.)

I sing songs that span many years, starting with the ever-fresh currents of life that will soon merge with the ancient rivers of death.

_Whitman introduces the central metaphor of life as rapids flowing into death's streams._

> In you whoe’er you are my book perusing, In I myself, in all the world, these currents flowing, All, all toward the mystic ocean tending.

Whether you are reading my book, or I myself, or anyone in the world, all these currents flow toward the mysterious ocean of eternity.

_The poet universalizes the journey, connecting reader, self, and world to the same cosmic flow._

> O little shells, so curious-convolute, so limpid-cold and voiceless, Will you not little shells to the tympans of temples held, Murmurs and echoes still call up, eternity’s music faint and far.

O small, intricately shaped shells, cold and silent—if held to the ears, will you not still evoke murmurs and echoes, the distant music of eternity?

_The shells symbolize the poet's words, carrying faint, eternal sounds from the sea of Time to the listener._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/leaves_of_grass_se/chapters/as-consequent-etc
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/leaves_of_grass_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/leaves_of_grass_se/chapters