in the five lines of this stanza. The intense emotion felt by the speaker is engendered in him because of the loss of such a “powerful” star now fallen, the night which makes murky such a star, and the helplessness of man in the face of the universe. Lincoln is the powerful star now fallen. The night which hides the star is presumably the weak and evil nature of men like John Wilkes Booth who assassinated Lincoln. And the helplessness of man in the face of his or his loved ones’ mortality create a “harsh surrounding cloud” about the speaker that “will not free [his] soul” (Whitman 265).
Stanza three symbolizes the hope of eternal life through the lilac bush, a flowering plant with “heart-shaped leaves of rich green”, whose “perfume strong” the speaker loves (Whitman 265). As each moment of a man’s life is a miracle, so the lilac’s every leaf is a miracle. The speaker breaks a sprig from this plant as the stanza closes. In stanza four the speaker uses the thrush to symbolize the solitary song of celebration that mimics the song or life of great men. In the middle of the “secluded recesses” the shy and hidden bird sings it own song, like a hermit who is withdrawn to himself. The great man must often sing a solitary song, as Lincoln did regarding abolition and the Civil War, in the midst of swampy opposition. However, great stars like Lincoln or a Gandhi or a Martin Luther King, Jr., men who strive for great realizations in society by their own example, often are willing to die (as all three did) because they must be true to their inner self much like the thrush would die if it could not sing, “If thou wast not granted to sing thou would surely die” (Whitman 265). In a way, Whitman is suggesting that Lincoln is more at peace by being dead because of what he believed in than if he would have lived and been untrue to his inner being.
Stanza four is the speaker’s attempt to find some m...