A Note in a Bottle

A Poem by Colton Warr

I go down with this ship...

“A Note in a Bottle”

A Poem by Colton Warr

Why has it been so long?

So long, since you’ve been gone

As I stare at my phone

As usual, all alone

Still sinking like a stone

Still Reminiscing

You’re still the one I’m missing

The one I wish I was kissing

I hope, but it’s more like wishing

It feels like Centuries

That I’ve been looking for your energy

Although they’re like tiny treasuries

I want to blow away all of these memories

I want to move on, but can’t

I want to be strong, but scant

I know it’s wrong, this rant

You were a seed that grew into a plant

I decided to pen this as the water rushes in

I decided to confess, boy what a sin

I decided to undress the idea of us again

I decided to stay, with this ship that’s sinkin’.

© 2014 Colton Warr

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angel

From:LEAVES OF GRASS,by Walt Whitman:

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather’d every rack,
the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring; But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells; Rise up- for you the flag is flung- for
you the bugle trills,

For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths- for you the shores
a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead

Posted 5 Years Ago

angel

Colton Warr, my man!You are a true romantic! Staying with the sinking ship, Oh, Captain! Ny Captain!
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About this poet

read poems by this poet
Walt Whitman was born on May 31, 1819, in West Hills, New York, the second son of Walter Whitman, a housebuilder, and Louisa Van Velsor. The family, which consisted of nine children, lived in Brooklyn and Long Island in the 1820s and 1830s.

At the age of twelve, Whitman began to learn the printer’s trade, and fell in love with the written word. Largely self-taught, he read voraciously, becoming acquainted with the works of Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, and the Bible.

Whitman worked as a printer in New York City until a devastating fire in the printing district demolished the industry. In 1836, at the age of seventeen, he began his career as teacher in the one-room school houses of Long Island. He continued to teach until 1841, when he turned to journalism as a full-time career.

He founded a weekly newspaper, Long-Islander, and later edited a number of Brooklyn and New York papers. In 1848, Whitman left the Brooklyn Daily Eagle to become editor of the New Orleans Crescent. It was in New Orleans that he experienced firsthand the viciousness of slavery in the slave markets of that city. On his return to Brooklyn in the fall of 1848, he founded a “free soil” newspaper, the Brooklyn Freeman, and continued to develop the unique style of poetry that later so astonished Ralph Waldo Emerson.

In 1855, Whitman took out a copyright on the first edition of Leaves of Grass, which consisted of twelve untitled poems and a preface. He published the volume himself, and sent a copy to Emerson in July of 1855. Whitman released a second edition of the book in 1856, containing thirty-three poems, a letter from Emerson praising the first edition, and a long open letter by Whitman in response. During his lifetime, Whitman continued to refine the volume, publishing several more editions of the book. Noted Whitman scholar, M. Jimmie Killingsworth writes that “the ‘merge,' as Whitman conceived it, is the tendency of the individual self to overcome moral, psychological, and political boundaries. Thematically and poetically, the notion dominates the three major poems of 1855: ‘I Sing the Body Electric,' ‘The Sleepers,' and ‘Song of Myself,' all of which were ‘merged’ in the first edition under the single title Leaves of Grass but were demarcated by clear breaks in the text and the repetition of the title.”

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Whitman vowed to live a “purged” and “cleansed” life. He worked as a freelance journalist and visited the wounded at New York City–area hospitals. He then traveled to Washington, D. C. in December 1862 to care for his brother who had been wounded in the war.

Overcome by the suffering of the many wounded in Washington, Whitman decided to stay and work in the hospitals and stayed in the city for eleven years. He took a job as a clerk for the Department of the Interior, which ended when the Secretary of the Interior, James Harlan, discovered that Whitman was the author of Leaves of Grass, which Harlan found offensive. Harlan fired the poet.

Whitman struggled to support himself through most of his life. In Washington, he lived on a clerk’s salary and modest royalties, and spent any excess money, including gifts from friends, to buy supplies for the patients he nursed. He had also been sending money to his widowed mother and an invalid brother. From time to time writers both in the states and in England sent him “purses” of money so that he could get by.

In the early 1870s, Whitman settled in Camden, New Jersey, where he had come to visit his dying mother at his brother’s house. However, after suffering a stroke, Whitman found it impossible to return to Washington. He stayed with his brother until the 1882 publication of Leaves of Grass (James R. Osgood) gave Whitman enough money to buy a home in Camden.

In the simple two-story clapboard house, Whitman spent his declining years working on additions and revisions to a new edition of the book and preparing his final volume of poems and prose, Good-Bye, My Fancy (David McKay, 1891). After his death on March 26, 1892, Whitman was buried in a tomb he designed and had built on a lot in Harleigh Cemetery.

Along with Emily Dickinson, he is considered one of America’s most important poets.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

Leaves of Grass (David McKay, 1891)
Good-Bye, My Fancy (David McKay, 1891)
Leaves of Grass (James R. Osgood, 1881)
Passage to India (J.S. Redfield, 1870)
Leaves of Grass (J.S. Redfield, 1870)
Leaves of Grass (William E. Chapin, 1867)
Drum Taps (William E. Chapin, 1865)
Sequel to Drum Taps (William E. Chapin, 1865)
Leaves of Grass (Thayer & Eldridge, 1860)
Leaves of Grass (Fowler & Wells, 1856)
Leaves of Grass (self-published, 1855)

Prose

Complete Prose Works (David McKay, 1892)
November Boughs (David McKay, 1888)
Memoranda During the War (self-published, 1875)
Democratic Vistas (David McKay, 1871)
Franklin Evans; or, The Inebriate (New World, 1842)

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twitter
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O Captain! My Captain!
Walt Whitman, 1819 - 1892
O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather’d every rack,
the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring; But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells; Rise up- for you the flag is flung- for
you the bugle trills,

For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths- for you the shores
a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

Posted 5 Years Ago

Enter your e-mail address
related poems
Beauty by Elinor Wylie
Julius Caesar, Act I, Scene II [I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus] by William Shakespeare
Huge Vapours Brood above the Clifted Shore by Charlotte Smith
Kin to Sorrow by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Beauty and Beauty by Rupert Brooke
occasions
Funerals
from the book
Leaves of Grass
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman (1855)
IndieBound
Worldcat
poem
About this poet

read poems by this poet
Walt Whitman was born on May 31, 1819, in West Hills, New York, the second son of Walter Whitman, a housebuilder, and Louisa Van Velsor. The family, which consisted of nine children, lived in Brooklyn and Long Island in the 1820s and 1830s.

At the age of twelve, Whitman began to learn the printer’s trade, and fell in love with the written word. Largely self-taught, he read voraciously, becoming acquainted with the works of Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, and the Bible.

Whitman worked as a printer in New York City until a devastating fire in the printing district demolished the industry. In 1836, at the age of seventeen, he began his career as teacher in the one-room school houses of Long Island. He continued to teach until 1841, when he turned to journalism as a full-time career.

He founded a weekly newspaper, Long-Islander, and later edited a number of Brooklyn and New York papers. In 1848, Whitman left the Brooklyn Daily Eagle to become editor of the New Orleans Crescent. It was in New Orleans that he experienced firsthand the viciousness of slavery in the slave markets of that city. On his return to Brooklyn in the fall of 1848, he founded a “free soil” newspaper, the Brooklyn Freeman, and continued to develop the unique style of poetry that later so astonished Ralph Waldo Emerson.

In 1855, Whitman took out a copyright on the first edition of Leaves of Grass, which consisted of twelve untitled poems and a preface. He published the volume himself, and sent a copy to Emerson in July of 1855. Whitman released a second edition of the book in 1856, containing thirty-three poems, a letter from Emerson praising the first edition, and a long open letter by Whitman in response. During his lifetime, Whitman continued to refine the volume, publishing several more editions of the book. Noted Whitman scholar, M. Jimmie Killingsworth writes that “the ‘merge,' as Whitman conceived it, is the tendency of the individual self to overcome moral, psychological, and political boundaries. Thematically and poetically, the notion dominates the three major poems of 1855: ‘I Sing the Body Electric,' ‘The Sleepers,' and ‘Song of Myself,' all of which were ‘merged’ in the first edition under the single title Leaves of Grass but were demarcated by clear breaks in the text and the repetition of the title.”

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Whitman vowed to live a “purged” and “cleansed” life. He worked as a freelance journalist and visited the wounded at New York City–area hospitals. He then traveled to Washington, D. C. in December 1862 to care for his brother who had been wounded in the war.

Overcome by the suffering of the many wounded in Washington, Whitman decided to stay and work in the hospitals and stayed in the city for eleven years. He took a job as a clerk for the Department of the Interior, which ended when the Secretary of the Interior, James Harlan, discovered that Whitman was the author of Leaves of Grass, which Harlan found offensive. Harlan fired the poet.

Whitman struggled to support himself through most of his life. In Washington, he lived on a clerk’s salary and modest royalties, and spent any excess money, including gifts from friends, to buy supplies for the patients he nursed. He had also been sending money to his widowed mother and an invalid brother. From time to time writers both in the states and in England sent him “purses” of money so that he could get by.

In the early 1870s, Whitman settled in Camden, New Jersey, where he had come to visit his dying mother at his brother’s house. However, after suffering a stroke, Whitman found it impossible to return to Washington. He stayed with his brother until the 1882 publication of Leaves of Grass (James R. Osgood) gave Whitman enough money to buy a home in Camden.

In the simple two-story clapboard house, Whitman spent his declining years working on additions and revisions to a new edition of the book and preparing his final volume of poems and prose, Good-Bye, My Fancy (David McKay, 1891). After his death on March 26, 1892, Whitman was buried in a tomb he designed and had built on a lot in Harleigh Cemetery.

Along with Emily Dickinson, he is considered one of America’s most important poets.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

Leaves of Grass (David McKay, 1891)
Good-Bye, My Fancy (David McKay, 1891)
Leaves of Grass (James R. Osgood, 1881)
Passage to India (J.S. Redfield, 1870)
Leaves of Grass (J.S. Redfield, 1870)
Leaves of Grass (William E. Chapin, 1867)
Drum Taps (William E. Chapin, 1865)
Sequel to Drum Taps (William E. Chapin, 1865)
Leaves of Grass (Thayer & Eldridge, 1860)
Leaves of Grass (Fowler & Wells, 1856)
Leaves of Grass (self-published, 1855)

Prose

Complete Prose Works (David McKay, 1892)
November Boughs (David McKay, 1888)
Memoranda During the War (self-published, 1875)
Democratic Vistas (David McKay, 1871)
Franklin Evans; or, The Inebriate (New World, 1842)

facebook
twitter
tumblr
embed poem

O Captain! My Captain!
Walt Whitman, 1819 - 1892
 O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather’d every rack,
      the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
      While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring; But O heart! heart! heart!
      O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.
      O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells; Rise up- for you the flag is flung- for
      you the bugle trills, 
                                  
         For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths- for you the shores
             a-crowding,
          For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
             Here Captain! dear father!
               This arm beneath your head!
                 It is some dream that on the deck,
                   You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still,
          My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will,
          The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done,
          From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
               Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
                 But I with mournful tread,
                   Walk the deck my Captain lies,
                     Fallen cold and dead.

Rating /100

Kathy Van Kurin

'A Note in a Bottle'
Colton Warr,
The capturing in the mind of memories and the time passed is like, as your title states, 'A note in a bottle.' As I read along it felt like the rise and fall of the depths as the reality of where life is now to where it had been. We have our memories, our golden and shining memories. Time and experiences do come and go. I wish you success and help and hope in this life.
Blessings,
Kathy

Posted 5 Years Ago

Nightfeather

Hope does not always act like the beacon of salvation, for it can also act as an illusion. One can dream of his/her loved one, but in the end, it is all but a dream. For the world has moved on and time waits for no one. This poem holds hope, not an illusion but the poem which houses in the reality of our world. You had the power to write this poem, for had hope that your heart would feel the reconnection with a new link and wish for the bond to become even more powerful than before. I like this brilliant poem.

Good job :D

Posted 8 Years Ago

8 Years Ago

Thank you so much for your kind words! They continue to bless me and humble me! I thank you for thei.. read more

8 Years Ago

No problem my friend and you are right :D

sereenaoutloud

There is a really strong rhythm to this, can feel a light beat as you read it.
It sad and you can feel the longing through out.
"It feels like Centuries
That I’ve been looking for your energy"
I especially like this, the image of soulmates searching for each other came to mind!!
Great write! :)

Posted 8 Years Ago

8 Years Ago

Thank you so much! I appreciate the kind words! Thank you for coming all the way back to read this o.. read more

8 Years Ago

oh i know it was such a trek lol but well worth it...great writes!! :))

Traci

A very deep, well written poem with an undertone of sadness, emotionally felt throughout. It is times like these we want to move on, leaving the memories behind, yet something inside clings to hope.

Posted 9 Years Ago

9 Years Ago

Thank you very much! Indeed, my friend, you are correct. This is all about hope, a terrible clawing .. read more

Ezekiel Silver

An unusual poem with a very deep and emotional theme. You can clearly get a sense of how the voice of this piece is feeling, which I like. Nice work.

Posted 9 Years Ago

9 Years Ago

Thank you very much! I'm glad you enjoyed it!

9 Years Ago

You're welcome.

realmwriter

I like the play here. The note in a bottle as a sinkin ship, that's quite good.

Posted 9 Years Ago

9 Years Ago

Thank you very much! I am glad you enjoyed it, thanks for reading!

9 Years Ago

I did indeed and you are most welcome

Prakalaka

it's great....uve really got a gift, this spontaneous flow of words expressing the truest and purest feelings....this poetry made me cry.

Posted 9 Years Ago

9 Years Ago

Thank you so much for reading!! I appreciate your kind words! This was a poem I wrote after me and .. read more

9 Years Ago

i know how it is when others feel something from ur words...it's like u can share ur own pain with o.. read more

B.J

Wow! really find this incredible, moving on is the hardest thing you have to do. These lines I really like.
I want to blow away all of these memories

I want to move on, but can’t

I want to be strong, but scant

I know it’s wrong, this rant

You were a seed that grew into a plant

I decided to pen this as the water rushes in

I decided to confess, boy what a sin

I decided to undress the idea of us again
I decided to stay, with this ship that’s sinkin’.