One Year ago—jots what?

One Year ago—jots what?

God—spell the word!  I—can't—

Was't Grace?  Not that—

Was't Glory?  That—will do—                                                [Glory] ''Twas just you –

Spell slower—Glory—

Such Anniversary shall be—

Sometimes—not often—in Eternity—

When farther Parted, than the Common Woe—                       [When] sharper

Look—feed upon each other’s faces—so—

In doubtful meal, if it be possible

Their Banquet’s true—                                                    

I tasted—careless—then—

I did not know the Wine

Came once a World—Did you?

Oh, had you told me so—

This Thirst would blister—easier—now—

You said it hurt you—most—

Mine—was an Acorn’s Breast—

And could not know how fondness grew

In Shaggier Vest—

Perhaps—I couldn’t—

But, had you looked in—

A Giant—eye to eye with you, had been—

No Acorn—then—

So—Twelve months ago—

We breathed—

Then dropped the Air—                                                        [Then] lost

Which bore it best?

Was this—the patientest—

Because it was a Child, you know—

And could not value—Air?

If to be “Elder”—mean most pain—

I’m old enough, today, I’m certain—then—

As old as thee—how soon?

One—Birthday more—or Ten?

Let me—choose!

Ah, Sir, None!

                                                            F301 (1862)  296    

Italicized notes on left are alternatives Dickinson indicated
on her manuscript. I use Cristanne Miller's Emily Dickinson's 
Poems As She Preserved Them for these side notes.

The intimate, head-long, confessional tone of this poem is way ahead of Dickinson’s time. So is Dickinson’s use of meter for emphasis and tone. The first stanza plunges the reader into a tempestuous reminiscence. Something happened a year ago—something that preceded a break-up with a lover or perhaps was the love affair itself. The lines are short, the punctuation strong, and the mood erratic. The first four lines end with spondees as the poet grasps at words: "jots what?,” “I—can’t,” “Not that,” “will do.” These starts and stops mirror the sense of rupture. The last line of the stanza slows the pace to a crawl. Dickenson wants the reader to focus: “Spell slower—Glory.” The first word of that line, “Spell,” benefits from both its meanings of “enchantment” and “speak it out” or “recite it slowly.” This, then, is an anniversary of something glorious. Dickinson milks the word for all it’s worth.

            The second stanza maintains a stately pace; the lines lengthen, and the meter evens into iambs—all of which support the poet’s reflection on the event and its meaning. She thinks that she and the man may get to celebrate this anniversary “Sometimes—not often” in an afterlife. They may be able to look at each other, “feed upon each other’s faces” if the notion of a heavenly “Banquet” is “true.” The stanza implies that they will not see each other in this life, at least not in the privacy where they might share such looks and love.

            Dickinson continues with feast imagery in the first line of the next stanza, but this time looking back in time instead of ahead: she tasted the “Wine” of a once-in-a-lifetime love, but was “careless—then.” She didn’t realize how rare it was. “Did you?” she asks the lover. She thinks he did but wishes he had somehow made her recognize it. Her pain would heal faster if she had appreciated the love (or experience) at the time. Dickinson phrases this as “Thirst” blistering, as if thirst were a a patch of skin rubbed raw and needing a blister to heal. “Thirst” and “blister” make an unusual metaphor—but one that works.  

            The next metaphor is Shakespearean in its fresh, compact visuality. The “Acorn’s Breast” conjures up an image of the acorn. It is breastlike and smooth. It shelters the oak seed. The image is that of the poet: her own breasts are young and firm; in her the poet and mature woman is just beginning to swell against its shell.

            Unlike the smooth acorn, though, her lover’s chest is hairy. Since she has no way to gage the “fondness” in his “Shaggier Vest,” she was not convinced by his claim that the affair hurt him more than it hurt her. If you had “looked in,” past the shell, she says, you would have seen “A Giant,” not just an acorn. We would have been “eye to eye.” This stanza is a subtle admission of guilt as well as expression of love and regret: the poet was careless, unappreciative of the rare love she was offered. She didn’t understand him, couldn’t understand how a man loves. And yet she wishes he would have seen past the acorn shell.

            The poem moves on with the wonderfully concise transition, “So—.” Dickinson doesn’t say anything more specific than that a year ago they “breathed— / Then dropped the Air.” The dropping of the affair is not like the dropping of a heavy weight through the air. It is the dropping of the air itself.  Dickinson voices another regret in this, the fourth, stanza—one more pointed: Maybe I was able to bear the loss better, or at least you think so, because I was just a “Child… / And could not value—Air?” That is why, perhaps, I seem to be “patientest.”

            The last stanza returns to the short questions and lines of the first. The poet attempts to equalize the relationship: She has aged in the last year and is “old enough” to be an “Elder” and feel an elder’s pain. She wonders when she’ll be as old emotionally as her lover: “One—Birthday more—or Ten?” Let me choose, she begs, for I want that now.

            There is an immediacy to the poem that still speaks. The variety of line length, sentence length, and meter; the reflection alternating with expostulation all keep the poem moving as if it were pouring out of the pen, the author torn by conflicting emotions. It reads in a natural if anguished voice, the poet confident in rendering both the specific sensuality of the acorn and in philosophizing over time and love.