Summary
Very little action occurs in the text of "The Portent." John Brown is executed at the beginning, his body hanging from a beam, his shadow falling on the green grass of the Shenandoah Valley. His body is identified by a cut on his head. The speaker also references Brown's violent efforts to combat slavery. Brown's head is covered, concealing his face and, the speaker presumes, the pain he feels at failing to witness a revolution. Finally, the poem depicts Brown's lengthly, wild beard (the source of his mocking nickname in the South) suggesting that it is an omen of the looming Civil War.
Analysis
With sharp language and haunting imagery, the poem deals with the conflicts and the moral conflict that presaged the Civil War. More specifically, it looks at the ways in which John Brown's actions highlighted the volatile national divide over slavery. In two brief stanzas, the poem explores ideas surrounding revolution, the law, and the abolition of slavery.
The poem opens with Brown "hanging from a beam" as his body is "slowly swaying." Melville then remarks that this execution was carried out according to the code of law, as is connoted by the parenthetical phrase "such the law." The speaker problematizes this idea of legality almost right away with a single-line exclamation of "Shenandoah!" which is the geographical dividing line between the North and South. The Shenandoah Valley was the area that separated the states where slavery was legal from those where it was illegal. With this single word, Melville is questioning the idea of what determines legality. Brown was executed for his violent actions, but these actions were carried out in an attempt to fight an institution that he believed violated the laws of nature, namely the treatment of human beings as property. The next two lines refer to a "cut" on the "crown" of his head, identifying him as John Brown. The speaker makes this clear in stating "Lo, John Brown." The final line of the stanza describes "the stabs that shall heal no more." There are multiple meanings at work here. The first is the literal one: Brown's injury here is final as it is fatal. The others imply that he was unable to continue his acts of rebellion and, furthermore, unable to precipitate a general revolt against slavery, the "stabs" referring to his murder of slaveowners.
The line "hidden in the cap" notes Brown's covered face. It conceals, as Melville phrases it, "the anguish that none can draw." This anguish is presumably not about his own demise but instead about the pain he feels in failing to successfully end slavery. It is a comment on both his concealed face and his interiority in these final moments. The following line, "so your future veils its face" again notes both his hidden face and also the uncertain nature of his legacy. It also sets up the poem's conclusion, gesturing at its main idea. The repetition of "Shenandoah" in the fourth line serves a structural purpose. In splitting both septets down the middle, it is a reminder of the legal purpose that this geographic boundary served. The word reminds the reader that it defined the line of where slavery was legal in the U.S. Additionally it also separates elements of the poem's contents. In both stanzas, the lines above "Shenandoah" deal with the physical details of Brown's execution. The lines below it discuss his past actions ("stabs that shall heal no more") and their impact on the future (his "streaming beard" symbolizing a "meteor of war"). A similar effect is achieved in the parallel references to Brown's name ("Lo, John Brown" and "Weird John Brown") in the sixth line of both stanzas. The poem's final lines are its most essential. Brown's "streaming beard" is seen beneath the hood on his head. In noting this, the speaker then intones his mocking nickname, "Weird John Brown," likely referencing how the beard played into his portrayal as crazed and violent. But the poem's final line about "the meteor of war" dispels this notion. With this final phrase, Melville flips the perception of Brown from outlier to soothsayer. If the beard is a symbol of his intense passion for abolition, comparing it to a meteor dignifies it as predictor of the arrival of the Civil War, not an object of mockery. Brown's feeling about the inhumanity of slavery as well as his by-any-means-necessary approach to fighting it would come to be seen not as "weird" but prescient for the central conflict of the war.
At its core, "The Portent" is a rewriting of Brown's legacy. Where contemporary assessments of his revolutionary actions were harsh and supportive of his swift punishment, Melville takes the long view of history and, correctly, understands the key role his actions would play in instigating the Civil War and ultimately bringing about the end of slavery. Like the other poems in Battle-Pieces, "The Portent" deals with the moral quandaries surrounding violence and the Civil War.
