Twice had Summer her fair Verdure
Proffered to the Plain—
Twice a Winter's silver Fracture
On the Rivers been—
Two full Autumns for the Squirrel
Bounteous prepared—
Nature, Had'st thou not a Berry
For thy wandering Bird?
-F950, J836, sheet 19, 1865
I heard Malcolm Guite on the podcast Literary Life recently talking about his new epic ballad, “Gallahad and the Grail.” (4.69 rating on Goodreads!) He was talking about how easy it is to over-determine a poem in the act of “interpreting” it. He made a canny joke, “Lord, lead us not into interpretation.”
So yeah, reminder to self. Sometimes it's best to evade interpretation. The best way to do that is to look at the form, what it is that makes the poem different, and beautiful, formally.
With a poem like this I can take pleasure from it without needing to make sense of it. First there is the sound, the pleasure of words on the tongue. They insist on being read out loud. In fact, this one insisted on being sung. I got out my guitar and a melody immediately presented itself.
This one is SUCH a pleasure to sing. First of all, the rhythm is trochaic, which means each line begins with an emphasized syllable, on a down beat. On top of that the beat you are hitting has a spitting “TW!” sound. The way the sound of “TWICE” opens each couplet of the first stanza, followed by the emphatic “TWO” that begins the final stanza, drives the beat of the song. This emphasis softens considerably when we get to the plaintive final couplet which begins with the softer N sound of Nature, completely changing the tone on the final chordal run.
Another thing this poem does that lends itself to melody are the runs of “feminine” ending rhymes, and especially the repetition of the “er” and “ure” sound. For me that drop in emphasis on the second syllable corresponds to a drop of a note on the musical scale. The melody I gave to this song naturally seemed to descend.
There is also the pleasure of the images. It’s cool imagining Summer personified and proffering “fair Verdure” to the “plain.” And how about that image of a silver fracture on a river?
A third pleasure is in the logical structure. Summer proffers fair verdure which then seems to result in a silver fracture on the frozen river. So the suggestion is, to me, (edging into interpretation now), that Summer is the lover that is offering "fair verdure" and the result is a rejection by winter, leaving one fractured and frozen. It’s a remarkable way to see the progression of summer into winter.
The second stanza does something equally astonishing, but the poetic logic of the poem now says: “Like a squirrel in autumn, I saved and saved for winter, but what did it get me? Now, alas, it’s spring time and I don’t even have a berry.” I want to interpret that on a personal level too. Like a squirrel in autumn, one invests in someone, invests enough to hopefully get through the tough times together, only to result in spring coming up with no fruit from the relationship.
Proffered to the Plain—
Twice a Winter's silver Fracture
On the Rivers been—
Two full Autumns for the Squirrel
Bounteous prepared—
Nature, Had'st thou not a Berry
For thy wandering Bird?
-F950, J836, sheet 19, 1865
I heard Malcolm Guite on the podcast Literary Life recently talking about his new epic ballad, “Gallahad and the Grail.” (4.69 rating on Goodreads!) He was talking about how easy it is to over-determine a poem in the act of “interpreting” it. He made a canny joke, “Lord, lead us not into interpretation.”
So yeah, reminder to self. Sometimes it's best to evade interpretation. The best way to do that is to look at the form, what it is that makes the poem different, and beautiful, formally.
With a poem like this I can take pleasure from it without needing to make sense of it. First there is the sound, the pleasure of words on the tongue. They insist on being read out loud. In fact, this one insisted on being sung. I got out my guitar and a melody immediately presented itself.
This one is SUCH a pleasure to sing. First of all, the rhythm is trochaic, which means each line begins with an emphasized syllable, on a down beat. On top of that the beat you are hitting has a spitting “TW!” sound. The way the sound of “TWICE” opens each couplet of the first stanza, followed by the emphatic “TWO” that begins the final stanza, drives the beat of the song. This emphasis softens considerably when we get to the plaintive final couplet which begins with the softer N sound of Nature, completely changing the tone on the final chordal run.
Another thing this poem does that lends itself to melody are the runs of “feminine” ending rhymes, and especially the repetition of the “er” and “ure” sound. For me that drop in emphasis on the second syllable corresponds to a drop of a note on the musical scale. The melody I gave to this song naturally seemed to descend.
There is also the pleasure of the images. It’s cool imagining Summer personified and proffering “fair Verdure” to the “plain.” And how about that image of a silver fracture on a river?
A third pleasure is in the logical structure. Summer proffers fair verdure which then seems to result in a silver fracture on the frozen river. So the suggestion is, to me, (edging into interpretation now), that Summer is the lover that is offering "fair verdure" and the result is a rejection by winter, leaving one fractured and frozen. It’s a remarkable way to see the progression of summer into winter.
The second stanza does something equally astonishing, but the poetic logic of the poem now says: “Like a squirrel in autumn, I saved and saved for winter, but what did it get me? Now, alas, it’s spring time and I don’t even have a berry.” I want to interpret that on a personal level too. Like a squirrel in autumn, one invests in someone, invests enough to hopefully get through the tough times together, only to result in spring coming up with no fruit from the relationship.
It's got to have a personal meaning, right? Because if you are just talking about actual seasons, then it doesn't really make sense, because there are always berries for the birds. The song-bird is the poet and she is searching for sustenance.
In looking at the poetic logic of the poem the meaning begins to become more clear. But there's more, we are sure of it, so we look for clues. That brings us to the next great pleasure in reading a Dickinson poem, the wrestling match with meaning. With Dickinson there is almost always the pleasure of the riddle. It's akin to the pleasure of solving a mystery.
This guessing is precisely where interpretation can start to become, perhaps, too personal. Lord, lead me not into interpretation. So I’ll ask you for yours instead. Here's my first question for you. Why are there two sets of seasons in this poem? And why do we have "Twice" given to us twice, followed by "Two," and then end on zero, on no berry, none?
Perhaps there is a personal reason for these two sets of seasons for Dickinson? But any biographical interpretation begs a question. How personal are Dickinson’s poems in the end? Did Dickinson intend for her poems to have universal resonance or didn't she? My understanding is that she was able to write in both personal and universal modes simultaneously, and even the most obscure poem is meant, in part, to be for a general audience. Using the word “Twice,” for instance, is meant to invoke a specific meaning for a reader. But what? What is “Twice” doing here then, on a broader level?
Another question. Where is spring in this poem? How come it is missing?
In looking at the poetic logic of the poem the meaning begins to become more clear. But there's more, we are sure of it, so we look for clues. That brings us to the next great pleasure in reading a Dickinson poem, the wrestling match with meaning. With Dickinson there is almost always the pleasure of the riddle. It's akin to the pleasure of solving a mystery.
This guessing is precisely where interpretation can start to become, perhaps, too personal. Lord, lead me not into interpretation. So I’ll ask you for yours instead. Here's my first question for you. Why are there two sets of seasons in this poem? And why do we have "Twice" given to us twice, followed by "Two," and then end on zero, on no berry, none?
Perhaps there is a personal reason for these two sets of seasons for Dickinson? But any biographical interpretation begs a question. How personal are Dickinson’s poems in the end? Did Dickinson intend for her poems to have universal resonance or didn't she? My understanding is that she was able to write in both personal and universal modes simultaneously, and even the most obscure poem is meant, in part, to be for a general audience. Using the word “Twice,” for instance, is meant to invoke a specific meaning for a reader. But what? What is “Twice” doing here then, on a broader level?
Another question. Where is spring in this poem? How come it is missing?
-/)dam Wade l)eGraff
P.S. Here's the song as it came out when I picked up my guitar.
P.P.S. Here's an acrostic written last week by one of my HS students. I thought it put the over-determination problem beautifully.
Letting
All
Unique
Readers.
Amusingly
Scholars
Create
How
Readers
Exactly
Imagine
Bright
Excellent
Reading.
My guess is that spring is not guaranteed sometimes.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the song, Adam. I loved the whistling part in the middle. Then you surprised me when you set it to the Violent Femmes’ Blister in the Sun, which has such different energy.
ReplyDeleteWhat I think I most appreciate in this poem is the sense of waiting, hoping, surmounting silver fractures, experiencing the seasonal cycle for two years. It feels like such a patient poem. And then, out of this experience, comes the gentle question: had’st thou a berry for thy wandering bird? It is plaintive. So humble. A berry. For me.
Who is she asking? Does “Nature” represent a person, someone she herself desires? Or is she witnessing, below her window, an actual bird in her garden, and seeing it search for a an actual berry to no avail? In other words, is this poem a personal plea or an act of empathy for another, a bird or friend?
One more thing that struck me about it. I don’t know how she does it, but doesn’t Dickinson surprise us at the end of the poem by lending the word “berry” so much sensuality? Maybe it’s the softness of those last two lines. As you point out, the lulling “n” sound of “Nature” shifts the tone. But then the kissing motion requires for the “b”s in berry and bird make us readers, even silently mouthing the words, into yearning lovers.
Ack. Published without proofreading… Meant to end with this sentence:
DeleteBut then the kissing motion required for the “b”s in berry and bird makes us readers, even if we are only silently mouthing the words, into yearning lovers.
That sentence was worth getting right. It's so perceptive.
ReplyDeleteblister in the sun was extra. But it was instructive because it gave me the idea that the final couplet of this poem should move into the chords of the chorus.
ReplyDeleteAlso, your take on seeing this as patient poem gives me some insight into the reason for her extending once into "twice." I suppose you could read that as impatience too though!
ReplyDeleteBoth — so human.
DeleteThe poet just wants a berry, a small thing yet very vital to her. The universe expects her to be very patient and wait for her turn. She wanders around the seasons very forlorn full of longing and yearning. Meanwhile two cycles of seasons pass. Nature is generous to the plains, rivers ( silver fracture is so beautiful), squirrels. Everything in sight is rewarded. There's abundance all around and yet nature continues being indifferent, uncaring, negligent towards the poet. The poet is like a child deprived of sweets/toys/ love. She sees no end to her waiting. There's no spring for her round the bend and we also end up feeling so sad for her. She puts forth her question in the last lines so sorrowfully as if she already knows the answer. Emily has covered this aspect of an uncaring God/ nature in countless other poems and we get it every time. Because we've been through similar experiences
ReplyDeleteThe poet just wants a berry! "and we get it every time"
DeleteThere is an echo in my mind from some Shakespeare play, in which a character marks time by counting out in this way. “Twice… twice…” (or is it “thrice”?). It is said formally, almost as an Incantation, laying emphasis on the passing of time by marking seasons. But I can’t land on it! The witches of Macbeth count, but I don’t think that’s the one. Is there any Bee who recognizes what I am dimly remembering?
ReplyDeleteFirst stanza:
ReplyDelete-- How a god might say: Two years went by.
-- But since it’s god-speak it harbors secrete geometry. Two-by-two. A heat/cold axis, and smooth-plain/fractured-flow axis. A geo-spiritual cage of sorts.
-- So, maybe it’s not about the passage of time. The ‘twice’ is about dimensionality. Summer squared, winter squared. The time, and what it contains.
Second stanza:
-- Two years for arboreal torporing rodents (sky rats) to fatten on the fruits of fall.
-- But implied spring (the time of berries) is fruitless, and the birds (torporless, flow-bound and free) go without. Unmoored by sustenance.
What's it all about? What's is not about? You're in there somewhere.
This comment reads as a poem itself, Nate!
DeleteGoing with your thought to read the two stanzas spatially — geometrically— instead of temporarily, I am intrigued by the idea of the bird (final word of the poem reveals the subject!) wandering across this space, these seasons, across these plains and rivers, among the squirrels and nuts. From a God’s eye view, outside of time, trace paths, scribble marks, across and around three-dimensional space, looking for our “berries.” That’s what we do. For 300-400 seasons or so before we stop wandering. I’m definitely in there somewhere. You got me.
Right. Outside of time.
DeleteI goofed. Or maybe was just imprecise:
Summer is the time of berries. But blooms come before.
So, spring is implied, but with a time delay.
So, there is in implicit time dimension.
Also, a couple of poems ago, Emily asserts that Spring time is God time.
Here, she implies it falls outside of the geo-spiritual cage.
(And that there’s nothing eternal about the divine.)