“Comrades! I am the bard of Democracy,” iconic American poet Walt Whitman wrote in his notebook in 1859. Over his 73 years (1819–1892) he made good on that claim. As Whitman bore witness to the rise of New York City, the Civil War and other major transformations in American life, he attempted to reconcile the famous contradictions of this country through his inclusivity and his prolific body of work. The author of one of the most celebrated texts of American literature—1855’s “Leaves of Grass”—came from humble origins in Long Island and Brooklyn but eventually earned a global audience that has never stopped growing. In this installment of Leonard Lopate on WBAI, Edward L. Widmer talks about a new exhibition he curated at the Morgan Library and Museum celebrating the 200th anniversary of Walt Whitman’s birth.