"
O Captain! My Captain!" is an
extended metaphor poem written by
Walt Whitman in 1865 about
the death of U.S. president
Abraham Lincoln. Well received upon publication, the poem was Whitman's first to be
anthologized and the most popular during his lifetime. Together with "
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd", "
Hush'd Be the Camps To-Day", and "
This Dust Was Once the Man", it is one of
four poems written by Whitman about the death of Lincoln.