Define 'Mystical moist night-air' from the poem When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer.
Answers
Answer:
The air is "moist" with dew or humidity, which sounds like a warm, sticky summer night to us. Every so often he looks up at the stars but, unlike the astronomer, he doesn't try to explain them or even express their beauty (though, in a sense, that's what the poem does). "Mystical" means unified with God or nature
Answer:
When I heard the learn’d astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.
Explanation:
Whitman first published "When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer" in 1865 in his poetry collection Drum-Taps. In the poem, Whitman conveys his belief in the limits of using science to understand nature. Rather, Whitman suggests, one needs to experience nature for true understanding, instead of measuring it.