Final answer:
In Walt Whitman's "O Captain! My Captain!", the ship symbolizes the United States, and the poem is a metaphor for the nation's experience during the Civil War and the mourning of President Abraham Lincoln's death.
Step-by-step explanation:
In Walt Whitman's renowned poem, "O Captain! My Captain!", the ship serves as a metaphor for the United States itself. The poem is an elegy, expressing Whitman's grief over the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. Whitman utilizes the imagery of a ship that has completed a perilous journey and has returned home victoriously, paralleling the end of the Civil War and Lincoln's role in restoring the Union. Despite the victorious return, the poem's mood is somber due to the captain's death, reflecting the nation's mourning for Lincoln.
The poem does not refer to a literal ship that was attacked or sunk during the Civil War, such as the U.S.S. Arizona, nor does it allude to ships used in the American Revolution. Instead, the poem's ship symbolizes the nation which had endured the tribulations of the Civil War, and the captain symbolizes Lincoln, whose leadership was lost at war's end. Through this symbolic narrative, Whitman captures both the relief at the war's conclusion and the sorrow of Lincoln's death.