Camden epilogue: Poetic irony

American poet Walt Whitman lived out his last years on Mickle Street in Camden, New Jersey. He died there in 1892 and was laid to rest in Harleigh Cemetery, where the graveside eulogy was delivered by the orator Robert Green Ingersoll:

"He never lost his hope. When the mists filled the valleys, he looked upon the mountain tops, and when the mountains in darkness disappeared, he fixed his gaze upon the stars."

Whitman spent much of his twilight revising and re-issuing Leaves of Grass -- "33 y'rs of hacking at it," the poet would say on releasing the final edition in 1891. Note 66 in the landmark collection begins,

"I DREAM’D in a dream, I saw a city invincible to the attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth"

When Camden dedicated its new city hall in 1931, chiseled into the granite of the massive neo-classic structure was this paraphrase of Whitman's words:

I DREAMED I SAW A CITY INVINCIBLE

In the harsh light of current events the irony glares back at us, inescapable, wrenching.

Then again, looking past the facade we learn that the building's cornerstone was laid in 1929. It opened its doors two years later, just as our nation began to claw its way out of The Great Depression.

Through the middle of the 20th Century, a vigorous blue-collar Camden gave Americans radios, nuclear-powered ships and soup. But like Akron and Detroit, Massillon and Youngstown and countless other cities staked to manufacturing, the city flickered and dimmed.

Camden's city hall stands today either as a monument to an ironic inscription or as a reminder of optimism in the face of economic ruin. I struggle to see it as the latter.

I wonder -- am I simply confronting reality? Or do I lack the spirit of my grandfathers?