Put up my lute!
What of—my Music!
Since the sole ear I cared to charm—
Passive—as Granite—laps my music—
Sobbing—will suit—as well as psalm!
Would but the "Memnon" of the Desert—
Teach me the strain
That vanquished Him—
When He—surrendered to the Sunrise—
Maybe—that—would awaken—them!
F324
(1862) 261
The poet’s solo audience is neither enthusiastic nor discriminating.
While this person (although it’s not entirely crazy to think the audience might
be Carlo her dog … but it is more likely it is either editor Samuel Bowles or
her stern impassive father) “laps” her work, he is unfortunately as
unresponsive “as Granite.” Who
wants the Great Stone Face for an audience? Might as well put up the lute! Worse, it doesn't matter if the mood is tragic and emotional--"Sobbing"—or hymnal and religious. The response is the same.
It
seems contradictory to me that the “sole ear” is both lapping up her music—and
music is surely a metaphor for her poetry—and being passive as a rock no matter what she writes. Perhaps
she means he, if it is a man, mouths words of praise and beseeches her for more
yet shows no real response. Perhaps, if it is Carlo, he laps at her with his
tongue as she reads, yet is ultimately not moved by poetry. Hey, he’s a dog!
 |
| Jean Leon Gerome painted this scene with the Memnon statues in 1858 |
The
second stanza refers to Memnon, the Ethiopian warrior king, son of Eos the dawn
goddess. “Memnon” means “ruler of the dawn.” He brought an army to Troy and
personally fought against Achilles, who killed him. Zeus granted him
immortality. One of the Colossi of Memnon, still standing across the Nile from
Luxor, was broken in a 27 BC earthquake. For years afterwards, until the Romans tried to repair it, its
remaining lower half of this statue was heard singing at sunrise.
Dickinson
makes loose reference to these aspects of the Classical Greek myth. She has the
shattered statue in mind, conflating the earthquake “strain / That vanquished
Him” with the sunrise song he is said to sing each day. If only her poetry had
that kind of power, she muses, she might wake up her audience.
Although
in the first stanza she has only one listener, at the end it is clear she is
hoping for a larger readership of her work, for she wants to write to “awaken—them.”
I wonder what she would think if she knew how many people are aware of and awed
by Emily Dickinson!
I wonder if lapping her work means he sets it in his lap, not reading it. In other words, ignoring it?
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for your blog. I read a few poems a week. Your analysis is very helpful. Quite the labor of love.
One of Franklin’s trusted handwriting clues for separating lower-case t from capitol T was whether ED’s horizontal stroke started to the left of and touched her vertical stroke or floated to the right without touching or just barely touched the vertical stroke (lower-case t). By that rule, the t of the final word, “them”, is clearly a capital T, which would change that word from an ordinary plural pronoun, “them”, to a third-person singular royal “Them”.
ReplyDeleteThe only person ED consistently addressed with a capital He, Him, or Master was Charles Wadsworth, who considered poetry a waste of time. Apparently, she couldn’t get him out of her head/heart, despite her parting gift of a sarcastic goodbye guilt trip, F322. Why Franklin did not follow his own rule in this case is a mystery to me.
Here’s an interpretation:
I might as well put up my lute! What use is my Music! The sole ear I cared to charm laps my music passively, like a granite hound. Sobbing would charm him just as well as poetry.
I wish the broken desert statue, Memnon, would teach me the music that brought him to his knees when he surrendered to the earthquake of 27 BC. Maybe that would awaken His Majesty.
A bit snooty, don’t you think?
Please pardon the "Anonymous".
ReplyDelete