Whitman by Meteor-Light

Astronomers have tracked down the astral subject of Walt Whitman's poem "Year of Meteors (1859-1860)" after years of trying to figure out what the hell he was talking about:

In the July issue of Sky & Telescope magazine, Olson and colleagues reveal that the event was indeed a "meteor progression" – something that occurs when a large meteor grazes the Earth's atmosphere and breaks into pieces that chase each other across the sky. "Meteor progressions are so rare that most modern astronomers have not even heard of them," Olson says. "In all of history, we can list only four."

The one described by Whitman, he adds, occurred on 20 July 1860 – a date that his team unearthed by searching the archives of newspapers and scientific journals . . .