Meditations: "The Learn’d Astronomer" by Walt Whitman

When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer

BY Walt Whitman

"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."

~*~

I love this poem by Uncle Walt. 

It reminds me of the story of a father

teaching his son how to ride a bicycle.

The father first had his son 

memorize all the parts of a bike,

then made him draw pictures of the bike,

and  then made him write articles about the bike.
Strangely enough, the kid still couldn't ride a bike.

Or 
that time on the TV show, Friends

The way Phoebe taught Joey the guitar

By NOT touching it

:  )

We can memorize, quantify, and diagram Nature all we want

Scientifically study it up and down to the smallest detail

But to truly understand the nature of Nature

We must "wander off" and experience it for ourselves

What Uncle Walt calls a mystical, intuitive experience

His poem is a great statement
Illustrating the different between Knowledge and Wisdom

A good lesson for living, as well.

Thanks, Uncle Walt!