Incredulous of Ought
But Blank – and steady Wilderness –
Diversified by Night –
Just Infinites of Nought –
As far as it could see –
So looked the face I looked opon –
So looked itself – on Me –
I offered it no Help –
Because the Cause was Mine –
The Misery a Compact
As hopeless – as divine –
Neither – would be absolved –
Neither would be a Queen
Without the Other – Therefore –
We perish – tho’ We reign –
-F693, J458, Fascicle 32, 1863
I think Emily is doing something radical with this poem. It can be read as either between two lovers OR as between the self and the self’s reflection. Is this on purpose? I think so, or at least I think it is likely she wrote it with both in mind.
Which of these two interpretations is the most useful to the reader? Love poems tend to exclude the reader. Perhaps one can live vicariously through them, or can more deeply appreciate one’s own love, or mourn one’s lack of love (as would be the case in this poem.) But a poem which may be read, instead, as a confrontation with one’s own self is going to have more potential impact for a reader, or at least it does for this one. This double nature is often true of Dickinson’s love poems, many of which may also be seen as a dialogue between self and soul, or self and God.
According to Judith Farr this poem is at “the crux of the Sue story.” This makes a lot of sense, and especially coming after F691, which is essentially about gazing into a lover’s eyes. In this interpretation the eyes that stare back, the other queen, is Sue. But, without dismissing that reading, I’m going to argue here that this poem is just as much about confronting oneself in a mirror. In the mirror is the image of another, whether that other is self or lover.
The poem starts off as a simile: “Like eyes that looked on wastes…” so looked these eyes. Why start off with comparison? Why not just get right to the point? Why are eyes being likened to eyes anyway? Perhaps it serves to set up the ambiguity between self and other. The eyes in a mirror aren’t actual eyes after all, they are “like eyes”.
Then there follows a full stanza and a half describing the wasteland these eyes see, the wilderness, the infinites of nothing and a blank so bleak that the blackness of night is the only relief (“diversified by night”). This is more repetitive than usual for Dickinson, but it makes sense here to go on and on about something that feels like it goes on and on, to wallow in the feeling of a barren landscape.
In the second half of the second stanza we read: “So looked the face I looked opon –/ So looked itself – on Me –” The term “itself”, used here to refer to the face, makes me think that it is a mirror that is being alluded to here. It would be strange to refer to a lover’s face as an “it”, but perfectly fitting to in referring to a face in a mirror.
My daughter Sofia took this shot yesterday
at the Museum of Art and Design in NYC.
It's "Self-portrait" by the artist Shary Boyle.
You can't see from this angle, but the head
on the porcelain figure has no face. You can
only see the face in the mirrored reflection.
The third stanza begins “I offered it no Help –/ Because the Cause was Mine –” Again we get that pronoun “it” in place of the other face, depersonalizing it. We also get a clue that the other face belongs to the poet because the cause of its helplessness is “mine.” I read a double meaning to “cause” here. You can read it as A. a person that gives rise to a condition or B. an aim that, because of a deep commitment, one is prepared to defend. So you can read this as saying. “I was the cause of the problem” or “I am the cause in need of support.” One way points outward and the other way points in. Both are true if, in reflection, the cause of the misery is also a miserable cause.
The cause might also be mankind’s. There is a bent in Dickinson’s poetry in 1863 toward poems that speak of renunciation. Cf. F665, “The Martyr poets – did not tell”. Looked at in this light, the following lines, about making a compact with misery makes more sense. Another common strain in Dickinson is seeing, paradoxically, the divine in the hopeless. There are several poems that lean in this direction, see F634 (“Had I presumed to hope-,”) for one such example. Another poem, F688 (“There is a shame of Nobleness,”) rejects God’s blessing even after death, or “Behind the Grave.”
"We perish – tho’ We reign –" we read. What does this mean? Judith Farr has an interesting biographical take on it*, but I think it makes sense to see this perishing as a spiritual victory gained through death. "It is in dying that we are born to eternal life” says the prayer of St. Francis. Or, if you prefer a Buddhist take, you can compare this idea to anatta, or “non-self.” You are not going to be Queen, perhaps, neither you NOR your reflection (or lover), but you will, paradoxically, reign in your perishing. One useful way of looking at it: in dissolving the ego, you are set free to simply be.
By tying the two interpretations of this poem together -lover and mirror- Dickinson creates a remarkably resonant space in which we begin to think of self as other and other as self. The membrane between the two begins to disappear, and in disappearing, the self transcends its circumference. In perishing, we reign.
-/)dam Wade l)eGraff
*David Preest writes, “Judith Farr convincingly suggests that the two women in this poem are Emily and Sue. As they look into each other’s eyes, they are unable to believe that there is anything for them but ‘Infinites of Nought.’ Emily cannot help Sue because the cause of the Misery was the compact between them which Emily’s love for Sue had brought about. Their compact is ‘divine,’ as they truly love each other, but ‘hopeless,’ as their lesbian, adulterous love is doubly impermissible. Neither wishes to be ‘absolved’ from the love by giving it up or to be a ‘queen in love’ without the other. So they ‘reign’ in each other’s hearts, but ‘perish’ in the circumstances surrounding their love.”
** In keeping with the mirror reading of this poem I wondered if Dickinson was making a pun on a compact mirror when she used the word “compact”, but according to my limited internet research, I could not find any use of the word in print before the early 1900s. However, compact mirrors, by other names, have been around for a long time I discovered: The earliest Compacts were cherished possessions of the kings and queens of ancient Greece. The box mirrors of those days were polished bronze, lavishly adorned with images of Pan, Eros, and Aphrodite, gods of playful mischief, passionate desire, and a more true kind of love.
The third stanza begins “I offered it no Help –/ Because the Cause was Mine –” Again we get that pronoun “it” in place of the other face, depersonalizing it. We also get a clue that the other face belongs to the poet because the cause of its helplessness is “mine.” I read a double meaning to “cause” here. You can read it as A. a person that gives rise to a condition or B. an aim that, because of a deep commitment, one is prepared to defend. So you can read this as saying. “I was the cause of the problem” or “I am the cause in need of support.” One way points outward and the other way points in. Both are true if, in reflection, the cause of the misery is also a miserable cause.
The cause might also be mankind’s. There is a bent in Dickinson’s poetry in 1863 toward poems that speak of renunciation. Cf. F665, “The Martyr poets – did not tell”. Looked at in this light, the following lines, about making a compact with misery makes more sense. Another common strain in Dickinson is seeing, paradoxically, the divine in the hopeless. There are several poems that lean in this direction, see F634 (“Had I presumed to hope-,”) for one such example. Another poem, F688 (“There is a shame of Nobleness,”) rejects God’s blessing even after death, or “Behind the Grave.”
"We perish – tho’ We reign –" we read. What does this mean? Judith Farr has an interesting biographical take on it*, but I think it makes sense to see this perishing as a spiritual victory gained through death. "It is in dying that we are born to eternal life” says the prayer of St. Francis. Or, if you prefer a Buddhist take, you can compare this idea to anatta, or “non-self.” You are not going to be Queen, perhaps, neither you NOR your reflection (or lover), but you will, paradoxically, reign in your perishing. One useful way of looking at it: in dissolving the ego, you are set free to simply be.
By tying the two interpretations of this poem together -lover and mirror- Dickinson creates a remarkably resonant space in which we begin to think of self as other and other as self. The membrane between the two begins to disappear, and in disappearing, the self transcends its circumference. In perishing, we reign.
-/)dam Wade l)eGraff
*David Preest writes, “Judith Farr convincingly suggests that the two women in this poem are Emily and Sue. As they look into each other’s eyes, they are unable to believe that there is anything for them but ‘Infinites of Nought.’ Emily cannot help Sue because the cause of the Misery was the compact between them which Emily’s love for Sue had brought about. Their compact is ‘divine,’ as they truly love each other, but ‘hopeless,’ as their lesbian, adulterous love is doubly impermissible. Neither wishes to be ‘absolved’ from the love by giving it up or to be a ‘queen in love’ without the other. So they ‘reign’ in each other’s hearts, but ‘perish’ in the circumstances surrounding their love.”
** In keeping with the mirror reading of this poem I wondered if Dickinson was making a pun on a compact mirror when she used the word “compact”, but according to my limited internet research, I could not find any use of the word in print before the early 1900s. However, compact mirrors, by other names, have been around for a long time I discovered: The earliest Compacts were cherished possessions of the kings and queens of ancient Greece. The box mirrors of those days were polished bronze, lavishly adorned with images of Pan, Eros, and Aphrodite, gods of playful mischief, passionate desire, and a more true kind of love.
I think this poem is an intense meditation on the man in the mirror as Michael Jackson sang. I'm personally not at all convinced by Farr's analysis that this is the crux of the Sue story.
ReplyDeletebrilliant read of my favorite Dickinson. Also on team-self. Have read this as a lament for being condemned to distance from the world at large, due to the cause of being a poet. She sees what the world sees when seeing her - an inscrutable being, an infinite of nought. But I am also not married and this could be informing my read.
ReplyDeleteStanza 1 presents a contradiction. EDLex defines "ought" as "anything; something". OED defines "ought" as "nought, zero", the exact opposite of the EDL definition, and never mentions the EDL definition. Given context, I'm going with OED's "nought":
ReplyDelete"Like Eyes that looked on Wastes –
Incredulous of [Nought]
But Blank – and steady Wilderness –
Diversified by Night –
Just Infinites of Nought –
As far as it could see –
Note: "nought" is the preferred British spelling of "naught"
Two poems previously (F691), d scribe (AKA Adam) wrote a powerful paragraph about eyes:
ReplyDelete“The questions abound, and I'd be curious to know if any of you have a good answer to any of them. But if I put those questions aside, put my logical sensibility aside, what I’m left with is something beyond mere logic, an exhilarating impression of the True Wonder of staring into someone’s eyes, the absolute privilege of it, the intense nowness of it, the disembodied forever feeling in it, the wedded bliss inherent, like paradise, like heaven, like the heaven OF heavens. When we gaze into one another’s eyes it is as if we are the newly unborn, born infiniter. (What a way to say it!) This poem must be one of the most romantic poems ever written. I'll remember it the next time I stare into someone's eyes.”
For me, Adam’s paragraph argues against the “face in the mirror” scenario.
Given Stanza 4’s surface wording, it’s hard to argue the lovers are male and female, Wadsworth and ED, unless ED felt compelled to doubly disguise the poem to protect Reverend Wadsworth (and his wife) from snooping sensationalists, ahem, but with ED all things are possible.
ReplyDeleteStanza 4 also makes the “face in the mirror” scenario unlikely.
With the above eliminations, I agree with Farr (1992) that:
ReplyDelete“‘Like Eyes that looked on Wastes –’ “is among the most powerful of Emily Dickinson’s poems. It is the crux of the Sue story, as Sue herself seems to have indicated”
(Farr, Judith. 1992. The Passion of Emily Dickinson, Harvard University Press, p. 161, paperback).
The compact in Lines 11-12, could be one of two possibilities:
ReplyDelete1. ED and Sue first became reading buddies at age 16 or 17 (1847 or 1848) when they shared their interest in poetry, especially Shakespeare. That friendship grew stronger, first to girlhood love, then to romantic love, and, probably, a physical lesbian relationship. At some point the two young women made a verbal contract to be “forever” faithful to each other and to poetry. That contract was “hopeless” because Sue, an orphan, needed a source of income, either teaching in another town or marriage, and neither was compatible with their contract.
2. A more likely “compact” was an agreement ED thought she had made with Charles Wadsworth in 1860 or 1861 to meet in Heaven after both their deaths and spend eternity together. That “compact” was also “hopeless” because Wadsworth’s understanding of this prenup was obviously different from ED’s, not to mention he was 16 years older, happily married, and the father of two children. This second verbal “compact” was foremost in her mind when she wrote this poem.
Line 5:
ReplyDeleteSurely ED knew the plural of "infinity" is "infinities", which suggests she might have intended the third "i" in "infinites" to be read long: "Just Infinites of nought –", six beats instead of seven.
Line 6:
Cleverly, the pronoun "it" refers to its "postcedent", "face", in Line 7.
Line 10:
Also cleverly, the pseudo-replication of "Because the Cause" caused me to do a doubletake. How bout you?
Ooops, make that "pseudo-repetition".
ReplyDeletei recall a changing room with 2 mirrors facing each other at a slight angle.
ReplyDeleteThe magical multiple reflections in each disappeared to an apparent infinity bending away into a distance undefined with my image in the middle.
I wonder if it was this effect that Emilie was experiencing when she composed this brilliant verse?
Try it yourself, its mind boggling!