Each Life converges to some Centre—

Each Life converges to some Centre—
Expressed — or still —
Exists in every Human Nature
A Goal —

Embodied (Admitted) scarcely to itself — it may be —
Too fair
For Credibility's presumption (temerity)
To mar (dare)—

Adored (Beheld) with caution — as a Brittle Heaven —
To reach
Were hopeless, as the Rainbow's Raiment
To touch —

Yet persevered toward — surer (stricter) — for the Distance —
How high —
Unto the Saints' slow diligence (industry) — The Sky —

Ungained — it may be — in a Life's low Venture —
But then —
Eternity enable the endeavoring
Again.

- F724, J680, Fascicle 35, 1863

*Alternate words for this poem I have added in parentheses.

When your goal is to get through 1800 Emily Dickinson poems, you don't want to spend too much time on just one. And yet almost all of Dickinson’s poems deserve lingering over. Poems such as this one need time to germinate and take root.

It’s a similar problem I had when I was reading Proust. There are a few thousand very dense pages of Proust's masterpiece "Remembrance of Things Past," and because of its length, we have tendency to want to push forward to try to get to the end. But this approach is antithetical to Proust. His sentences force you to slow down if you want to really understand them. Sometimes I read a Proustian sentence 5 or 6 times and I still haven’t come close to reaching the bottom of it. But each time I re-read it I go leagues deeper than the last time. In fact that’s WHY I read Proust, and it's part of the reason why I read Dickinson too. (Clarice Lispector comes to mind as well.) They demand slow reading. They are, in this sense, the best teachers for how to live life, which, when done well, demands slowing down considerably. It seems to me that most people are speed reading through life and yet the slower you go, the more the world comes to fruition, and the more "still" it is.

The task of getting a cogent reading of this poem across does seem as impossible as touching the raiment of a rainbow. This poem does, in that sense, mirror its own message. The rainbow of this poem glimmers, but when you try to touch it, the brittle heaven within breaks into a thousand pieces.

First of all, I'm not even sure whether this is meant to be a poem encouraging patience and diligence to reach the sky, or one exposing the futility of such a thing. If you read the 723 poems preceding this one you might come down on team Futility. Dickinson often seems to be pointing toward the idea of some future heaven as sham. Is the “sky” in this poem, and the Eternity we are given to reach it, real or illusion?

Regardless of which team you side with, I find this poem inspiring in the same way that I find Don Quixote inspiring. Quixote’s quest is, perhaps, idiotic. Why would you fight with windmills? But the romance, the hope, the chivalry, the imagination, and all that accompanies Quixote’s quest is the stuff that makes life so beautiful. So who's the idiot, the mocker or the mocked?

Each life converges to one center. Dickinson is tricky. Off the bat we have a statement that subverts itself. First of all, where is this center? Is it inside of us? Is it in front of us? If the center is the goal of life, as the 4th line of the first stanza leads us to believe, then is it a target we are aiming for? You might say this first line, itself, has more than one center.

The center already exists, inside of us, a kind of a primal core, but it is also something toward which we are converging. We are converging toward the center of ourselves, toward the center of life, is one way you might read this. This can either be Expressed (as it is in this poem) or Still. We can will the expression of this center, via some action, or we can just be "still," and be. The center is both there in stillness, and it is there as the end result of action. It's a rich paradox.

I once had a dream when I was a boy in which I saw a headless statue. At the base of the statue were the words “Thou wilt be what thou wilt be.” In the dream I knew these words were meant to be words to live by, but upon waking I wondered: do these words mean that I will be what I will myself to be? Or do they mean that I will be what I will be, no matter what? The words seemed to be saying the same paradoxical thing as the first line of this poem. They are both speaking of where we've come from and where we're going as the same place, one which may be either expressed or still.

I don’t want to miss any of the irony in Dickinson's poem about the impossibility of touching the rainbow’s raiment, but her poem is ultimately inspiring to me. It speaks of a great difficulty, an impossible goal, but it inspires me to persevere, like the saints, with a strict and slow industry and diligence. Dickinson may have been highly suspicious of Heaven, but she did seem to admire and emulate the saints. (See F665)

On the other side of the coin, there is that powerful word “still” (which Dickinson has used previously and to great effect in Fascicle 35). "Still" is a contranym which can mean, simultaneously, both stopping and continuing. If you couple this with the idea of the Eternity we find at the end of the poem, then we are given respite from that strict imperative in eternal stillness.

The poem encourages you to be strict and sure in your pursuit of your goal, to give it all you’ve got, but it also tells you not to worry. The goal may be impossible, but the last stanza of the poem seems to say, don’t stress about it too much. If you don’t achieve it in this life time, you still have all of eternity.

This poem encourages you to try as hard as possible to reach the center, and, conversely, it tells you to relax. The combination of these two opposites is what I think of as poise. It's what all athletes are trying to achieve. It is mastery. 

This poem makes me want to step up my efforts, but also takes away my anxiety about it at the same time. 

Okay, let's go through the poem and try to parse the wily syntax.

Dickinson's poems, and most especially her philosophical ones, can be quite difficult to understand on a purely logical level. They are easier to read if you sort of cross your eyes. It's like looking at one of those stereogram images. If you look at it just right, a 3D image starts to pop out from the two dimensional page. 

Each Life converges to some Centre—
Expressed — or still —
Exists in every Human Nature
A Goal —

The first line could stand alone: "Each Life converges to some Centre—"  This center isn’t just the innermost place, but is also “expressed” as a goal. It might be expressed, or it might be still, but regardless, “every Human Nature” has one. This is worth remarking on, because after the last few fascicles, which seemed hyper-focused on a loss of an epic love unique to Dickinson's life, this fascicle is much more geared toward the reader, toward us. Our lives, all of our lives, converge in some center. Whether or not it has expressed itself in us, there is, naturally, from our very center, a goal. 

Embodied (Admitted) scarcely to itself — it may be —
Too fair
For Credibility's presumption (temerity)
To mar — (dare)

We scarcely admit it, let alone embody it. It may be too beautiful for our belief (or, conversely, our doubt) to mar. Our own belief, in God, or anything really, can only presume. This center, this goal, is too beautiful for any of our presumptions to actually mar, or hurt, it. What a thought that is. This Center goes deeper and is more beautiful than our mental conception, than our belief about it.

Here Dickinson seems to be both discrediting credibility, and transcending it at the same time.

This Centre is too fair (beautiful) for credibility (belief).

The alternative words here, “temerity to dare,” are also worth some contemplation. This center goal is also beyond the boldness of our presumed beliefs to dare. 

Adored (Beheld) with caution — as a Brittle Heaven —
To reach
Were hopeless, as the Rainbow's Raiment
To touch —

This center/goal/heaven we adore and behold cautiously because it is brittle. It breaks easily. But, alas, we can no more reach it than we could touch a rainbow.

Yet persevered toward — surer (stricter) — for the Distance —
How high —
Unto the Saints' slow diligence (industry) — The Sky —

That “Yet” is heavy here. The rainbow’s raiment is impossible to touch, but when we persevere, how high the sky! The sky is actually higher because of our perseverance. Because the sky is higher, the rainbow is even harder to touch. But hey, the sky is still higher. (Emily's rhetoric makes my head spin.) That “Yet” says we must persevere and keep going, even more strictly, and with even more assurance, because of how great the distance is. (Here’s where I start finding myself feeling inspired to attempt the impossible.)

Ungained — it may be — in a Life's low Venture —
But then —
Eternity enable the endeavoring
Again.

Life’s low Venture (risks) may not lead to any gain. Note that “may” there. Dickinson has told us this Centre is impossible to touch, but the jury is out whether or not it is impossible to gain. No problem says the final lines, there will be infinite chances to try again. That's reassuring.

    -/)dam Wade l)eGraff