EXPLANATION: O Captain! My Captain! Lines 1-4 The first lines of the poem serve to begin the controlling metaphor upon which the rest of the poem builds. A metaphor is simply a figure of speech in which one thing is substituted for another, and a controlling metaphor is a metaphor that impacts, controls, or unifies the entire poem. In this poem, the "Captain" is a substitute for Abraham Lincoln, and the "ship" is the United …showed first 75 words of 1116 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1116 total…a single man. Nevertheless, the speaker of the poem chooses the individual over the larger nation. While "Exult O shores, and ring O bells" is explicitly a call for rejoicing, the speaker himself will not celebrate but will walk "with mournful tread," knowing that his Captain is indeed "Fallen cold and dead." The speaker thus celebrates the end of the Civil War but continues to express his need to mourn his fallen hero. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ **Bibliography**