Their Height in Heaven comforts not—

Their Height in Heaven comforts not—
Their Glory—nought to me—
’Twas best imperfect—as it was—
I’m finite—I can’t see—

The House of Supposition—
The Glimmering Frontier that skirts the Acres of Perhaps—
To Me—shows insecure—

The Wealth I had—contented me—
If ’twas a meaner size—
Then I had counted it until
It pleased my narrow Eyes—

Better than larger values—
That show however true—
This timid life of Evidence
Keeps pleading—”I don’t know.”


     -F725, J696, Fascicle 35, 1863


When trying to make sense of Dickinson’s poems it is helpful to read them in order as she preserved them. This poem is handwritten in the fascicle directly after one in which these lines appear, “How high — Unto the Saints' slow diligence  — The Sky —”

This poem seems to be continuing this thought. The “Their” and “They” in the first stanza appear to be referring to these saints. In the previous poem it appears, at first, that Dickinson is encouraging perseverance toward "The Sky,” toward the "Goal." But in this one she makes it clear that she was happier with her “meaner” lot on earth. In other words the previous poem is informed and changed by reading this one, and vice versa.

Dickinson is not comforted by the saints on high. Their glory is nothing to her. Why? Because she’s finite. She can’t see the infinite “Eternity.”

Often when reading Dickinson’s poems I am reminded of William Blake. When I read “I’m finite,” I think of Blake’s lines, “If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.” But whereas Blake is pointing toward the necessity of cleansing the doors of perception, Dickinson, the realist, is admitting she is finite. (For a terrific comparison of Dickinson and Blake’s work see Alan Blackstock’s article, “Dickinson, Blake and the Hymnbooks of Hell.”)

The “House of Supposition” in the second stanza also strikes me as Blakean. (I think of Blake’s “The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.”) This stanza is a gem:

The House of Supposition—
The Glimmering Frontier that skirts the Acres of Perhaps—
To Me—shows insecure—

(You expect a line break after "Frontier," but there isn't one in the original MS.) Here you have the house made up of suppositions. Around this house you have acres of perhaps. And beyond all this guessing you have the "glimmering frontier" of Heaven. All of the talk of the Glory of Heaven is just supposition. We can’t say for sure with our finite eyes what lies beyond.

The word “frontier” is interesting here. It has a distinctly American flavor, and conflates the Western frontier  with the idea of heaven, putting one in mind of the problematic "manifest destiny."

Also interesting is the word “insecure.” Though it is the house of supposition that is insecure, I think the way Dickinson words this implies that the supposed glory of heaven is a product of insecurity. It "shows insecure." If you are insecure about what you have here and now, you may delude yourself with thoughts of the hereafter. This sets up the next stanza:

The Wealth I had—contented me—
If ’twas a meaner size—
Then I had counted it until
It pleased my narrow Eyes—

The speaker is contended by the meaner wealth she "had." The past tense of the verb "have" is worth noting here. The speaker no longer has the thing that contented her. This may be a clue that Dickinson is speaking of lost love. This poem fits in with the many previous poems pointing to the loss of a lover to the lover's faith, which some suspect to be the Reverend Charles Wadsworth. (See for example F706 where this is made explicit, “For You – served Heaven – You know, Or sought to –/ I could not –/ Because You saturated Sight –/And I had no more Eyes/ For sordid excellence/ As Paradise”) So Wadsworth may well be the “They” referred to in the beginning of this poem. (Sue Dickinson is another possibility.) One way to read this poem is: "I lost you to heaven, but I have no comfort of ever seeing you there, since I don't know if it exists. Meanwhile I have lost you, the smaller wealth that pleased my “narrow eyes."

Better than larger values—
That show however true—
This timid life of Evidence
Keeps pleading—”I don’t know.”

In the final stanza of the poem we are told that the larger values (heaven, Eternity, etc) may be true, but we can’t know for sure. The timid evidence we have pleads “I don’t know.” This implies that, conversely, the smaller, meaner value is something that, though it may now be gone, at least there was evidence for. It was, at least, known.

Which all goes to say, "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may."

   -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

While looking for images for "glimmering frontier" I found this one, 

from a video game called Shimmering Frontier.

Look at those lovely Acres of Perhaps!