I taste a liquor never brewed –

I taste a liquor never brewed – 

From tankards scooped in pearl – 

Not all the Frankfort Berries

Yield such an Alcohol!

Inebriate of air  – am I –

And Debauchee of Dew

Reeling – through endless summer days – 

From inns of molten Blue.

When “Landlords” turn the drunken Bee

Out of the Foxglove's door,

When Butterflies – renounce their “drams” – 

I shall but drink the more!

Till Seraphs swing their snowy Hats –

And Saints – to windows run –

To see the little Tippler

Leaning against the – Sun!

                                             - F207 (1861) 

Squirrel getting tipsy
 on summer figs

This famous poem dances and reels with lively nouns and verbs – a perfect diction for the poet’s inebriation with summer. The imagery turns the common into the fantastic: from beer frothing in a mug to “tankards scooped in pearl”; from bees ending their honey-gathering season once the summer flowers have died to “Landlords” turning the “drunken Bee / Out of the Foxglove’s door”–  as if summer were a pub for bees and the onset of winter was closing time; to snow-tipped trees being angelic “Seraphs” swinging “their snowy Hats”; and from a reclusive and proper woman poet to a “little Tippler / Leaning against the – Sun” as if the sun were a lamppost outside the pub. Great stuff!

            Inebriation with summer is the theme of the poem and we see it in each stanza: 1)  summer’s inebriation is almost heavenly. The finest Rhine wine could never equal it. The pearls that are its froth remind us of the pearly gates of heaven.   2) Even the air is inebriating. A bit of  dew has the poet “Reeling” through the summer – whose beautiful roof is “molten Blue.” 3) The poor Bee has overstayed and drunk too much and must be bounced. Butterflies run out of steam at summer’s end and so “renounce” their tiny “drams” of liquor. But our poet never flags – she’ll pick up the slack! 4) She’s going to drink and debauch right into fall until the snow falls. And there she’ll be, leaning against the sun for all the Saints in heaven to stare at out the windows of Heaven.
          For another delightful poem on inebriation with life, see "We – Bee and I – live by the quaffing –."