Patrolling Barnegat- Walt Whitman

Wild, wild the storm, and the sea high running, Steady the roar of the gale, with incessant undertone muttering, Shouts of demoniac laughter fitfully piercing and pealing, Waves, air, midnight, their savagest trinity lashing, Out in the shadows there milk-white combs careering, On beachy slush and sand spirts of snow fierce slanting, Where through the murk the easterly death-wind breasting, Through cutting swirl and spray watchful and firm advancing, (That in the distance! is that a wreck? is the red signal flaring?) Slush and sand of the beach tireless till daylight wending, Steadily, slowly, through hoarse roar never remitting, Along the midnight edge by those milk-white combs careering, A group of dim, weird forms, struggling, the night confronting, That savage trinity warily watching.
About the Poem: It is set on a violent rainy night. The poet is walking along the beach, looking at the roaring waves. He then notices something out in the distance he thinks it might be a shipwreck and a distress signal He notices figures struggling as they try and walk through the confronting night. He is warily watching which means that he feared danger.

Structure: It is a sonnet a poem with 14 lines Sonnets usually display love and emotion, but since Whitman decided to use it to display danger, fear and violence in fact emphasises the intensity of the situation. The time rhyming was used in this sonnet was at the end of each line where all the words ended in ing. However, because ing is never really stressed, it creates an echo-like sound rather than a rhyme. Sonnets are usually written in pentameter verse 5 beats per line, but Patrolling Barnegat is written in hexameter verse 6 beats per line. This makes the lines sound extra long because we are used to listening to pentameter verses.

Language: The sonnet is written in present tense This makes us feel as if the events are occurring at that moment, spontaneously. We feel and understand the poets confusion because it seems as if we too are experiencing the events for the first time. This makes the sonnet more dramatic and tense because we do not know what is going to happen- it leaves us in suspense the whole way through.

The whole poem is basically a very vivid and complex description and list of the series of images that the poet sees. The punctuation is very limited and mainly used for the commas at the end of each line which doesnt allow us to breathe whenever we want to. This makes it seem like we are actually there too. The fact that there is a storm going on in the sonnet makes the images and sounds seem obscured which means that we still- even by the end of the poem cant be exactly sure about what the poet saw out in the storm. The readers are left at the end with a sense of uncertainty as they try to answer the question themselves. This is a way of involving the reader as they interact with the sonnet and are free to use their own imagination. There is some repetition in this sonnet (white combs). This emphasises the images which Whitman wants us to remember. Alliteration and assonance is used to create a range of sounds like in a storm. Whitman uses imagery to help create the perfect atmosphere for the sonnet. When Whitman states that he hears demoniac laughter we primarily assume that it is from the previously described gale, but when we think about it more deeply we realise that Whitman did not specify where the laughter was coming from which adds terror into the atmosphere. The savage trinity the waves, air and midnight- are in complete control, man is helpless.

Attitudes: The fact that Whitman is describing almost every little detail shows the reader that he is concentrating and almost admiring the storm.