"When I heard at the close of the day" belongs to "Calamus," the most deeply personal section of Whitman's Leaves of Grass. It is a poem of great importance as it allows us to penetrate Whitman's personality and to reconstruct his conception of life.
Though not structured in stanzas, this poem can easily be divided into three parts: in the first two lines of verse, the poet gives a brief yet meaningful account of the state of discontentment he lives in before understanding what matters to him in life; the following five lines of verse ("But the day when I rose at dawn from the bed of perfect health [...] all that day my food nourish'd me more, and that beautiful day pass'd well") describe the poet's return to the state of "innocence" and his new appreciation of nature; the last lines of verse ("And that night while all was still [...] that night I was happy") describe the beauty of his world once his "dear friend" has become part of it.
In this poem Whitman makes a significant admission: he does not care about gaining fame or public credibility, neither could make him happy. Being respected and acknowledged, though important, is not enough to make a life worth living, it can't bring joy or well-being. Still less, can joy be found in devious or superficial living ("when I carous'd […] still I was not happy"). What can bring happiness is the appreciation of the simple things that life has to offer. In this sense, this poem can be interpreted as a celebration of innocence and of the positive effects that nature exerts on humanity; but above all, what Whitman meant to celebrate and glorify was love.
This poem undoubtedly must have stirred up great controversy for its homoerotic content among Whitman's contemporaries, as it probably still does among many today. Putting controversy aside, anyone would find it hard not to admit that this is, in many aspects, an extraordinary poem: Whitman describes with incomparable effectiveness the feelings of tenderness and gaiety that take over his soul as he anticipates his lover's arrival, the state of complete contentedness that he is lulled into once his beloved is there for him.
In Western society, homosexuality is often looked at as an outrageous violation of the natural order of things, as something harmful not only to the individual but to all of Nature. In this poem Nature appears neither adverse to the two lovers nor offended by their union. On the contrary, the poet has the distinct feeling that Nature approves of his behavior and wishes him all the joy that love can bring. When the poet thinks about the one he loves most, and how he is about to reunite with him, every natural element seems to rejoice, becoming sweeter and more beautiful than ever before. When the two are together at last, the "waters roll slowly continually up the shores" as to congratulate him for his achievement. The "hissing rustle" of the ocean waters against the shore is a sign of Nature's blessing. The poet and his friend lay "under the same cover in the cool night," and Nature is not appalled or dissatisfied: she readily mothers their love as she does with that of all her children, indistinctly... The ocean judges no one, and is generous with all, just as the moon is.
And that night he was happy...