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A “Notice to Subscribers”
in small print on the bottom of the front page of this issue reveals that,
owing to serious “physical difficulties and the necessity of stopping
work altogether for a couple of months,” Traubel had applied to the Post
Office to combine the July, August, September and October issues.
What he was told by the Post Office is not known, but in any case
the June issue proved to be the last.
Traubel died on September 8, while on an excursion to Canada; he
was sixty-one. After a nonsectarian
funeral service, presided over by Percival Wiksell, he was buried in Harleigh
Cemetery, not far from Whitman’s tomb.
The last item, then, on the very last page of text in this last
Conservator could not be more perfect: it performs, superbly and with
eloquent brevity, a benediction and a valediction; it was composed by
a camerado; and its last sentence offers one final, awesome redefinition
of the significance of Leaves of Grass.
If
all the theologies (guesses about God) were to sink in the quicksands
of the word war. If all Greek and Hebrew originals were lost.
Out of Leaves of Grass would come the flowers of worship
satisfying “the soul, and forms and ceremonies to meet the use
of temples and groves in the religious expression of vital events, as
marriage and burial ceremonies. “Whispers of Heavenly Death“
hold more comfort for the mourners than any other scripture we have.
This explains the mental rest derived from them.
We argue no more about God or immortality.
Confucius said: “I would that all men might write a book about
God. Time so spent would be profitable to the soul.” Leaves of Grass— biography of a man—is
the biography of God. Percival
Wiksell. This is the final item in the
final Conservator. In his November 1917 essay “Why Men Write”
(28:141), Traubel had occasion to refer to the remark of Confucius:
“ We used to be told that God wrote a book about man.
Confucius suggested that every man should write a book about
God. That wouldn’t help God any. But it’d do a lot for you and me.” |