Shells from the Coast mistaking—

Shells from the Coast mistaking—
I cherished them for All—
Happening in After Ages
To entertain a Pearl—

Wherefore so late—I murmured—
My need of Thee—be done—
Therefore—the Pearl responded—
My Period begin


    -F716, J693, fascicle 35, 1863


The syntax of this poem is a bit tricky, but perhaps if it were easier to follow, we’d miss the pearl. There's something about the process of working to understand a poem that makes it more clear.

The sense of the poem, as I read it, goes like this:

I mistook the shells from the coast.
I cherished them as if they were everything.

It so happened that ages later
I was entertaining a pearl.

Why are you so late, I murmured,
My need for thee is over.

Since your need for me is over, the Pearl responded,
My time can begin.

The shells on the coast are not the same as the pearl. They are just the shells that once protected the pearl. The pearl would not be found on the coast, anyway, but in the ocean. They are hidden at certain depths. You must dive for them. 

The shells on the shore might symbolically represent any means of protection that is no longer needed. At first you might mistake the means of protection as the thing itself. Aren’t we all a little like walking shells sometimes? All we can see, it seems, are each other’s defense mechanisms. We so rarely dive deep for the pearl. 

In the second stanza we find out that it’s not until we no longer need the pearl that it begins to form, or already has. Where is it found then? Deep within. 

The pearl might represent many things. Perhaps to Dickinson it referred to Sue Dickinson, the pearl of F451. Or perhaps the pearl is a reference to poetry, as it is in F282. (That might help account for that word "period," which is a word tied to art, as in her "late period.") Or maybe it is a spiritual reference, like the “pearl of a great price” in Matthew 13:46. It could have any number of referents. But suffice to say that whatever the thing of “great price” is for you, it cannot be found in the shells littering the shore, and, furthermore, Dickinson intimates, it is only when we have no more desire for the pearl that it truly becomes apparent to us. 


    -/)dam Wade I)eGraff

The Sun kept setting—setting—still

The Sun kept setting—setting—still
No Hue of Afternoon—
Upon the Village I perceived
From House to House 'twas Noon—

The Dusk kept dropping—dropping—still
No Dew upon the Grass—
But only on my Forehead stopped—
And wandered in my Face—

My Feet kept drowsing—drowsing—still
My fingers were awake—
Yet why so little sound—Myself
Unto my Seeming—make?

How well I knew the Light before—
I could see it now—
'Tis Dying—I am doing—but
I'm not afraid to know—


     -F715, J692, fascicle 35, 1863


I find this poem both brave and uplifting. It’s transcendental in the truest sense of the word.

The poem is encapsulated in the first line, “The Sun kept setting—setting—still”. This is a poem about dying, and the setting of the sun foreshadows the dying of the self. The poem announces that the sun kept setting (past tense) but also that it is still setting (present tense). We might deduce from this that it always will set, that it will “still” continue after we die. But that “still” is doing double duty here. The sun sets until it stops, until it becomes still. The word “still” here is a contranym. It carries the quality of both continuance AND its opposite, ending.

You could say “still” carries another sense too, which is that of “calm.” When marked off by a dash, it seems to say to us, “Be still.” All three meanings that are instilled in the word “still” here will play out in this poem.

    The Sun kept setting—setting—still
    No Hue of Afternoon—
    Upon the Village I perceived
    From House to House 'twas Noon—

The first line enjambs into the second, “still/ No Hue of Afternoon.” You might say the sun, in its eternal recurrence, is always pitched at noon, even as the speaker is dying. If it stays noon, then there will be no “hue of afternoon,“ a phrase which brings the idea of the sunset into the poem. This metaphor, in a poem about dying, evokes old age. The latter part of our lives takes on a “hue,” and may eventually become as colorful as a sunset.

Dickinson’s sunsets are famous. Someone should really publish a book of all of her sunset poems next to famous paintings of sunsets. It would be instructive to read them all. One of the great things about studying Dickinson is that her metaphors take on enormous meaning over the course of her oeuvre, and sunsets are no exception.

The word “hue” also evokes its near homophone, “You,” especially when the poem is spoken or sung out loud as it is meant to be. In a continual noon there is no afternoon hue, but also, perhaps, no “You”, no Beloved. This idea is of a noon without “hue” or “You” is continued in the last line: “From house to house it is noon.” We note that it is still a house at noon. It is not yet a home.

Second stanza:

    The Dusk kept dropping—dropping—still
    No Dew upon the Grass—
    But only on my Forehead stopped—
    And wandered in my Face—

The first line of the second stanza echoes the first line of the first stanza in its rhythm and meaning, with a slight twist. The sun sets, but the dusk drops. The weight gets a little heavier here. The first line of the first stanza is a susurration of ess sounds. The first line of the second stanza alliterates too, but this time the D drops in. The dusk becomes percussive, as if there were drums in the distance.

Dew upon the grass, like the hue of the sunset, is something to be hoped for. This dew “stops” on the dying speaker, a sweat on the forehead born of the struggle of dying, and then finally the dew becomes tears. It wasn’t until I sang this poem that I got that the dew “wandering in my face” was meant to evoke tears wandering over the singular beauty of the dying speaker’s face. “And wandered in my face” is a strange phrase and I wonder if Dickinson isn’t playing off the idea of wandering the face of the earth. The poet’s face becomes the earth’s, and the tears are all those who are restlessly wandering.

The speaker is crying. Why? Physical pain? Emotional pain? Release? Joy? All of that seems to be happening at once here.

Third stanza:

    My Feet kept drowsing—drowsing still
    My fingers were awake—
    Yet why so little sound—Myself
    Unto my Seeming—make?

The Feet drowsing drowsing echoes the sun setting setting and the dusk dropping dropping. Feet is another powerful symbol that paces through the course of Dickinson’s poems. A foot is both literal feet in Dickinson AND a symbol for poetic meter. (A poetic foot is a unit of meter composed of two or more accented or unaccented syllables.) Anytime you see the word foot or feet in Dickinson, look out for a metaphor about poetic verse. (F372 is a great example of this.) Dickinson, in saying her feet kept drowsing, is talking about literal feet, but she also is speaking of her poetry becoming more and more difficult to write. If you concede that her feet are also her poetry, then the following lines make more sense; “Yet why so little sound—Myself/ Unto my Seeming—make?”

“Sound” here, if we are speaking of poetry, may refer to music, but also depth. This is what the poet is doing with her hands and her “feet”, writing poetry, and the sounding of the poetry is winding down. For Dickinson writing is the way the self is expressed.

If you think about these lines in a literal way though, it’s a little creepy that the fingers are still writing even as the feet are dying, but it’s vintage Dickinson to envision herself, and us, in such an immediate situation.

I think there must be a dozen ways to take the last line of this stanza. For every reader it will sound unto their seeming a bit differently. But the general gist is that the “seeming” of self is becoming less and less as we die.

This philosophical thinking of Dickinson is often difficult to fathom. Take that word “seeming” for instance. It strikes me as Shakespearean here, “...Myself/ Unto my Seeming—make.” Self is made of seeming. I’m reminded here of the Wallace Stevens’ line about death, “Let finale be the finale of seem.”

Stanza 4

This poem could end after stanza one and it would be great. Stanza two adds an emotional starkness and makes it even better. Stanza three brings philosophic introspection to the table. But it's the fourth stanza that really brings the poem home.

    How well I knew the Light before—
    I could see it now—
    'Tis Dying—I am doing—but
    I'm not afraid to know—

The repetitions in this poem make it uncommonly musical. It almost asks to be sung. So when you get to the first line of the 4th stanza, you expect the same repetition of words that is in the first line of the first three stanzas. But you don’t get it. Instead you get the echo delayed until the third line, and even then, it’s a half rhyme. 'Tis dying I am doing.” Setting setting > dropping dropping > drowsing drowsing >> dying doing.

Note that dying is not passive here. Dying is doing. You do death. And, if you are doing it well, you do it without fear, because you have transcended the personal. You KNEW the light. And you knew it WELL. But look at what Dickinson does in that second line. She combines the past tense and the present. What a move. It seems to make perfect sense as we read it, but it’s actually odd. She’s imagining herself from beyond death, but she’s imagining this while she’s still ALIVE. She can still see the light. The sun is still setting.

That last line, “I’m not afraid to know,” is loaded. She’s not afraid to know she is dying, but also, she’s not afraid to know the light. The “know” in the last line is following on the heels of the “knew” in “the light I knew before” in the first line of the stanza. She’s not afraid to know death is coming is the initial reading of the last line, but the deeper second insight here is in knowing the continual light of the present moment. To know the light is more than merely “seeing” it.

The last line is courageous and assertive. It’s one thing to be able to calmly say you aren’t afraid to know you are dying, but the power in this poem is that the true object of that knowing is in not being afraid to know the light.

That’s a lot of analysis. But I think this poem works on a subconscious level that precedes analysis. You read it with the innate knowing of a deeper Self that lies beyond analysis. It’s a poem I hope to have on my bedside to read, or have read to me, before I close my eyes for the last time.


  -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

sunset by Monet

"Dickinson had a habit of standing in rapt attention as if she were listening to something very faint and far off. We children often saw her at sunset, standing at the kitchen window, peering through a vista in the trees to the western sky, – her proud little head thrown back, but her eyes raised and one hand held characteristically before her.” -Barton Levi St. Armand

No Man can compass a Despair—

No Man can compass a Despair—
As round a Goalless Road
No faster than a Mile at once
The Traveller proceed—

Unconscious of the Width—
Unconscious that the Sun
Be setting on His progress—
So accurate the One

At estimating Pain—
Whose own—has just begun—
His ignorance—the Angel
That pilot Him along—


     -F714, J477, Fascicle 33, 1863



This poem, which ends Fascicle 33, starts with an aphorism, “No man can compass a Despair.” This line seems to derive from the poem that proceeds it in the fascicle, with its line about the “Boundaries of pain.” As Dickinson is wont to do, she takes this aphorism and extends it in increasingly complex ways. It's a common move for her. See F686 for another good example. 

The “compass” in the first line sets us up for the “round” in that second line. Now we find ourselves in strange geometric territory. A road is normally long and narrow, but here the poet has it as “round.” The round road of Despair you are travelling on goes outward from the center-point cause of the pain in all directions, circumferentially. ("My business is Circumference," Dickinson wrote in a letter to Thomas Higginson.) Though you are attempting to travel away from the pain, you can only see a little ways ahead, maybe a mile at most. A mile is about as far as the eye can see in daylight. 

It’s fortunate that we aren’t conscious of the Despair we still have ahead of us. It's also lucky that we aren’t aware that we are running out of time. “Unconscious that the sun/ be setting on his progress.” These are rather terrifying lines. Also we note the word goalless. There is no goal because the self wants to go backward, but is forced to go forward. The self doesn't even want to lose the pain as it is what connects it back to the beloved. 

The entire poem, I think, could be considered one sentence that would go without line breaks like this, “No man can compass a despair, as round a goalless road, no faster than a mile at once, the traveler proceed, unconscious of the width, unconscious that the sun be setting on his progress (and) so (in)accurate (is such) a one at estimating pain, whose own has just begun, (that) his ignorance (is) the angel (that) pilot(s) him along.” If one could shoe horn that sentence into prose, it might sound something  like: No man can take the measure of the circumference of his despair, which he travels along without any goal, since his goal is behind him. He can see at most a mile ahead of him at a time, having no idea of the width of this circle, not even realizing that the sun is setting on his progress. He who is only at the beginning of his pain can’t be accurate at estimating its circumference, but at least he has the angel of his own ignorance to keep him in the dark. 

It’s a bleak poem.

These aphoristic poems beg a question. They seem to presume an audience, but who? The poet herself? It would be odd to write yourself a poem that begins, “No man can compass a Despair." Is it just a cold, hard look at her own fate, as if spoken by the muse? It is akin to Dante’s “Abandon all hope ye who enter here.” Is she just reminding herself that life is going to be miserable and then end? The angel here is not a promising one either. It's just our own ignorance of the depth of pain we will go through. Yeesh. But if Dickinson was writing these poems for an audience (us), then it is we who are being reminded of our dismal fate. We are like Saul in the book Samuel, and Dickinson is the witch of Endor telling us that we will die in battle. (Dickinson even calls herself the witch of Endor in a letter to her nieces. See the letter here.)

Is Dickinson telling us we should be grateful for our own ignorance? I don’t think so. If this poem exists, it’s because it is meant to prepare us, to gird us up, for the inevitable. Is this poem meant to inform us and thereby kill the angel of ignorance? I think so.

 

 -/)dam Wade l)eGraff


P.S.

Putting these poems over chords structures and letting the rhyme scheme and word play dictate the melody is a terrific way to hear what’s happening in the poem. When you sing this one, for instance, you hear all of those ending “ess” sounds; compass, goalless, unconscious, and progress. You tend to emphasize them more. Also the rhyming run of once, sun, one, pain, begun and along rolls beautifully. I highly recommend this practice. I did this one starting in G>D>/D>G, alternating throughout the song.  It’s also a great way to memorize the poem. 

You left me – Sire – two Legacies –

You left me – Sire – two Legacies –
A Legacy of Love
A Heavenly Father would suffice
Had He the offer of –

You left me Boundaries of Pain –
Capacious as the Sea –
Between Eternity and Time –
Your Consciousness – and me –


   -F713, J644, Fascicle 33, 1863



                               


The "Eternity" from Dickinson's original MS of this poem is a work of art all its own. It is well worth reading Dickinson's poems in the original, as it can add so much to the experience. Look at the majesty of that E;  the curve of that t, the top of which flows down the ages of the word to cross that second smaller t; the y at the end of the word bolstering it from behind and giving it that subtle underline. There is also that strange break in the middle of the word between the r and the n. She seems to have picked up her pen there for a moment, as if to break eternity in two. And how about that blot of a dot for the i? It really marks the spot. If you look close it looks like she dotted it thrice, each dot making a visceral point. Dot dot dot.

Alright, onto the poem. I was dismissive with this one at first. More of the same I thought. You think I would've learned by now to never second guess Dickinson though. The more I dove into this poem, the more inspired I found it to be. 

These emotionally intense love poems are a lot, especially when you read one after another after another. How does Emily keep it up? I admire her stamina, but stamina to what end? How many weeks, months, years has Emily been feeling this level of intensity? 

But this poem seems too perfect to signal unbearable pain. I think this is why I was originally put off. There are two nearly perfectly symmetrical iambic pentameter quatrains with uncharacteristically perfect end rhyme. Each stanza begins neatly with “You left me.”

If you turned this poem on its side it would resemble a double flame, flame to flame, or better yet, a double crown, Sire to Sire. (Hmm. Dickinson talks about double-sided Monarchs elsewhere in this fascicle. See F709 for example.)

Though the feeling of "You left me" may be brutal in real life, in a highly formalized poem like this it can seem maudlin. “You left me. You left me. Woe is me.” This poem plays itself out in that space between the real and the idealized.

This poem is very pretty, to the ear and to the eye. A little too pretty. On purpose? 

Shakespeare’s sonnets were also ornately over the top. But as with Shakespeare, we begin to see the nuances flower from within the confines of the structure. Let's dive into the subtleties.

    A Legacy of Love
    A Heavenly Father would suffice
    Had He the offer of –

The first meaning I get from these lines is, “The love you left behind as a legacy for me would be enough for God, if that’s who was entertaining the offer. But He's not, I am!” This reads to me like a barb directed at the reverend Charles Wadsworth. 

But if you squint and look again you can see the a double meaning. The lines may also mean something like this, “You left me a legacy of love, Sire. A heavenly father would suffice (for me) if only He could offer me the same thing that you do.”

She’s lost her man to his faith, and it's not a faith she shares. The Heaven he’s aiming toward doesn't work for her. This is ironic because Heaven, in her opinion, isn't as good as the man. You can see other examples of these sentiments in F706:

They’d judge Us – How –
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

And were You lost, I would be –
Though My Name
Rang loudest
On the Heavenly fame –

And were You – saved –
And I – condemned to be
Where You were not –
That self – were Hell to Me –

The wonder is that here, just a few poems later, Dickinson has, through an act of extreme poetic compression, put these ideas into just a few lines.

The subtleties pick up in the second stanza. How about the plural in "Boundaries of pain"? If someone left you a boundary of pain, that would be okay. At least it's not without boundaries. It’s not boundless pain. But what if someone leaves you boundaries of pain? That plural leaves the idea of openness... open. You could have two boundaries or you could have a million. You don’t know where that boundary ends, what the boundary of the boundary is. It’s painfully open. Perhaps you are feeling a different boundary to that pain every day. But that is also promising. That means some days it is less. Is the pain lessening a bit overall? It seems to be.

Perhaps that’s why she is beginning to prettify the poems up? Poetry is winning. Form is overtaking the content. (Emily is a master of this. See F372, the famous poem beginning "After great pain a formal feeling comes,” a poem which is ABOUT form and the way form heals. That poem begins in perfect meter, then stumbles and breaks into chaotic meter and then reforms again in perfect lockstep.) The form is firmly in control in this poem. No slant rhymes indicating something is "off."

Those boundaries are still sea-sized though. Her pain is oscillating between Eternity (aching for it) and (Time) mortality. The stakes are high. And how does the poem end? The boundary, it turns out, is also between consciousness and me. To help us understand what Emily means by consciousness we turn to earlier poems. Especially helpful here is this stanza from F709.

“But since Myself — assault Me —
How have I peace
Except by subjugating
Consciousness?”

These lines, from just a few poems back chronologically, suggest that if you subjugate consciousness, you are also stopping the assault from Me. "Me" is complicated because it signifies "Us," as in I am you, and you are me. So I think Emily is saying something like - there is a boundary between Me and Consciousness because I am only myself when I am with you. Otherwise I am a separate being, a fraction, a lone consciousness.

So although Dickinson wraps this poem up in an awfully pretty bow, when you unwrap it you get an endless proliferation of meaning. Because of the bottomless nature of eternity and Me-ness, we can endlessly contend with this poem, and with its intimations of the beloved, from the sharply separate point view of a consciousness stuck in time.


/)dam Wade l)eGraff 

I could suffice for Him, I knew—

I could suffice for Him, I knew—
He—could suffice for Me—
Yet Hesitating Fractions—Both
Surveyed Infinity— (+delayed, +deferred)

"Would I be Whole" He sudden broached—
My syllable rebelled—
'Twas face to face with Nature—forced—
'Twas face to face with God—

Withdrew the Sun—to Other Wests—
Withdrew the furthest Star
Before Decision—stooped to speech—
And then—be audibler

The Answer of the Sea unto
The Motion of the Moon—
Herself adjust Her Tides—unto—
Could I—do else—with Mine?


This is a poem that wavers between going forward toward wholeness with a lover and withdrawing from wholeness into solitude. It hesitates between two possibilities. Because this liminal space is so difficult to navigate for the poet, the poem's expression is difficult to parse. The conclusion of this poem could be read two different ways. The poem ITSELF hesitates. Let's go through it line by line.

    I could suffice for Him, I knew—
    He—could suffice for Me—

The poet and her beloved would be enough for each other.

    Yet Hesitating Fractions—Both

But both of them, each only a fraction of the whole, hesitated while they…

    Surveyed Infinity—    (+delayed, +deferred)

This line cuts two ways. We hesitated BECAUSE we both surveyed Infinity, wondering if that is what we wanted, is one way to read it. But if you look at the alternate words Dickinson provided here (delayed, deferred) you see a different reading is also possible. We both hesitated, therefore delaying and deferring infinity. If we didn't hesitate then we could be whole together, infinite. There is a wavering on this phrase, which ripples through the poem. Surveying is quite different from delaying and deferring.

    "Would I be Whole" He sudden broached—

He asks, “Would I be whole with you?” He caught her by surprise with this question.

    My syllable rebelled—

The poet wanted to say yes, but that syllable rebelled against her.

    'Twas face to face with Nature—forced—
    ‘Twas face to face with God—

The syllable “yes” rebels, perhaps, because Dickinson is “forced” to face her own autonomous and withdrawing nature. I say perhaps because the syntax is tricky. In the end of the poem "nature" represents the tides responding to the moon. So the juxtaposition of these two lines could be saying that “natural” attraction, chemistry, or being “face to face with Nature” was “forced” against religious feeling, being “face to face with God—." I come to this conclusion after reading dozens of poems before this one in which there appears to be a conflict between Dickinson’s desire for a lover (probably the Reverend Charles Wadsworth, but possibly Sue Gilbert) and that lover’s duty to God and all that entails. Dickinson has been laying down argument after argument in the poems for choosing natural human love in the here and now over a religious love looking toward a future heaven. There is ALSO the poet's own reticence as hinted at in such poems such as F706, where she says "I cannot live with You –/ It would be Life –." 

As the two lovers hesitate,

    Withdrew the Sun—to Other Wests—
    Withdrew the furthest Star
    Before Decision—stooped to speech—

The Sun went to other Wests (a day or so passed), the stars withdrew (nights passed), before the poet could stoop to speak. It was a long hesitation! The double use of the word “Withdrew” here is significant and recalls the rebellion of the syllable. The stars and sun withdrew just like the syllable did, just like the poet herself does.

"Withdrew the furthest Star” is such a beautifully grand way to say this. Dickinson is the furthest star withdrawing. Stunning lines like this litter Dickinson’s poems like land mines.

It is notable that the poet has to STOOP to speech. In a way that’s what poetry is, the "inexpressible" stooping to words. The feeling for being whole with the lover OR withdrawing and staying a fraction, apart from the lover, is so overwhelming on both sides of the equation that a simple yes or no must, eventually, be stooped to.

But then once it is spoken?

    And then—be audibler

    The Answer of the Sea unto
    The Motion of the Moon—
    Herself adjust Her Tides—unto—
    Could I—do else—with Mine?

Whatever answer the poet gives, yes or no, the response of the tides of the Sea to the motion of Moon, that irresistable force, is even louder (audibler).

You could take this either way, depending on how you see “nature” in this poem. Either the natural attraction of the tides of the sea to the moon is like her irresistible attraction to the lover OR, if you read "nature" here as the poet's withdrawing nature, the tides of the poet must follow the moon of her vocation, and separate in solitude, feeding off "that White Sustenance – Despair –." Is the attraction that speaks louder than her syllable her natural attraction to the lover or to her own independent nature? Even in the ambiguity of this ending this poem “hesitates." 

It would be instructive to get a vote from you which way you believe this poem leans, toward a yes to the beloved, or a yes to withdrawal. Or would you agree that this poem is caught in limbo, leaning both ways at once? 

    -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

                               .

I think Emily would have appreciated this explanation 

of the moon's effect on the tides by Neil deGrasse Tyson. 

Perhaps it would have helped her make a decision? 

I meant to have but modest needs —

I meant to have but modest needs —
Such as Content — and Heaven —
Within my income — these could lie
And Life and I — keep even —

But since the last — included both —
It would suffice my Prayer
But just for One — to stipulate —
And Grace would grant the Pair —

And so — upon this wise — I prayed —
Great Spirit — Give to me
A Heaven not so large as Yours,
But large enough — for me —

A Smile suffused Jehovah's face —
The Cherubim — withdrew —
Grave Saints stole out to look at me —
And showed their dimples — too —

I left the Place, with all my might —
I threw my Prayer away —
The Quiet Ages picked it up —
And Judgment — twinkled — too —
That one so honest — be extant —
It take the Tale for true —
That "Whatsoever Ye shall ask —
Itself be given You" —

But I, grown shrewder — scan the Skies
With a suspicious Air —
As Children — swindled for the first
All Swindlers — be — infer —


    -F711, J476, Fascicle 33, 1863


This poem recalls for me F687 in which the poet asks the Mighty Merchant for the one thing she wants, one which she is willing to give her entire being for, but the Merchant only smiles (+"sneers") and denies her. These poems are about unanswered prayers and skepticism.

The poet starts off by claiming she meant to have “modest” needs, just to be content and to have Heaven. One might wonder how receiving heaven could be considered “modest,” and it does seem, at first, a bit cheeky. But she goes on to say that she just wanted what was within her “income." I take this to mean that she only asked for as much as she could afford. She’s not asking for a freebie. She wants to “keep even” with life.

Though this poem seems to be about religious faith on the surface, and most people will read it this way, you can also read it as being about a relationship. In the first poem of this fascicle the poet sighs “for lack of Heaven - but not the Heaven God bestow.” In that poem, and several others by Dickinson, Heaven refers to the beloved. It is safe to assume that the Heaven in this poem may also be of the more secular kind.

Dickinson is the most economical of poets, so it’s notable that she takes up the entire second stanza just to say that she doesn’t need to ask for both contentment AND heaven, since Heaven includes them both. What is she really saying? I think it’s a subtle point, that though being in heaven (in the presence of the beloved) may not always be smooth and easy, she would still be content there anyway. It’s a way of saying that she would be content even it was difficult, as long as she was with her beloved.

I haven’t seen the term “Great Spirit” show up before in Dickinson. It feels like a very transcendentalist descriptor of God. It almost sounds Native American, though I doubt that’s what Dickinson was going for. This Great Spirit in this poem though doesn't seem so great. It seems a little mean-spirited actually. In the 4th stanza God “smiles” at the narrator's prayer for Grace. Then the cherubim withdraw (no Heaven for you!) and finally even the normally grave saints come out and show their dimples. Going from grave to smiling because someone asks to be content and have a small bit of Heaven makes one wonder what kind of God this is. This one seems to be making fun of a sincere supplicant.

The narrator doesn’t like it one bit. She says, “I left the Place, with all my might —/ I threw my Prayer away —”. That sounds awfully angry to me, leaving a place with ALL YOUR MIGHT and THROWING your prayer away.

What does Dickinson mean when she says “The quiet ages” picked the prayer up that she threw away? Does she mean it fell upon endless silence? Or does she mean the meek may continue to pray away, but not her, as she no longer means to be "quiet"? It’s an intriguing line. The quiet ages pick up the prayer and Judgment (Dickinson's shorthand for a judgy God) twinkles at these quiet "ages" who have taken up the same prayer. He seems to be laughing at the ones who are so honest that they expect God to be honest too when he says in the scriptures “"Whatsoever Ye shall ask —/ Itself be given You." The poet calls this promise a “tale.” The poet isn’t buying it. From now on she will be scanning the skies (looking at the heavens) with suspicion, because, she says, if you are swindled when you are young, then you expect all future promises to be part of a swindle. Once bitten, twice shy.

George Whicher suggests that this poem is humorous in tone and that in Emily’s account of the incident it is as though God is asking, ‘Could not the victim share in the cosmic joke?’ He reads the poem as Dickinson sharing in the twinkle. Maybe so, but I find the tone of the poem angry and sad, even if it is shrewd. For example, I think the way the fifth stanza is eight unbroken lines instead of two quatrains belies a climax that is full of real feeling. File this poem under Dickinson’s wiser but sadder poems.

 

  -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

Doom is the House without the Door—

Doom is the House without the Door—
'Tis entered from the Sun—
And then the Ladder's thrown away,
Because Escape—is done—

'Tis varied by the Dream
Of what they do outside—
Where Squirrels play—and Berries dye—
And Hemlocks—bow—to God—

  -F710, J475, 1863, Fascicle 33


This poem begins with Doom, the most dismal place one can start, the place of damnation, of futility, of no escape, “the house without a door.”

How did we get here? The poet tells us. “‘Tis entered from the Sun.” Does the poet mean the literal sun? It’s helpful to start with the literal, as Dickinson generally does. The sun is necessary for life. It’s not something you would usually associate with death and doom. But you can’t have life without death. Just by being born you are doomed to die. So the sun works here on a literal level. Life is a ladder that leads to death and then you throw the ladder away, because there is no escaping death.

But since we are in a poem everything is also figurative. We are in the realm of metaphor and, therefore, interpretation. In a poem previous to this one in the same fascicle, F708, you get the line, “We turned our back upon the Sun.” The Sun (also, possibly, a pun on Son, see commentary for F708) is the source of light, so it is also, by the logic of opposites, the source of darkness. If you think of this in spiritual terms, then one way to interpret this poem, in keeping with the rest of the poems in fascicle 33, is that you only have doom if you have the expectation of Hope. Once you have tasted Paradise (which for Emily generally means the presence of the beloved), then all you can do is bemoan the absence of this Paradise when the beloved has gone away. The ladder that took you up to the beloved, up to the Sun, disappears because once you have tasted Paradise there is no going back. You can’t escape.

Meanwhile, from within the doom of hell (which we note is a “house”, not a “home”) you can only vary your misery by dreaming about what happens outside. “'Tis varied by the Dream/ Of what they do outside—” And what do “they” do “outside?” For starters, they PLAY. “Squirrels play.” Is there a better metaphor for the quicksilver joy of life than squirrels playing? It’s pure delight. But what of it? It’s no longer available to the doomed. The toys are put away.

What else happens outside? “Berries dye.” In some versions of this poem you will see this rendered as “Berries die.” This is because the first compiler of the complete poems, Thomas H. Johnson, interpreted Dickinson’s handwriting to read “die”. If you look at the original you can see why. 

I’m still not sure if Johnson wasn’t correct, but at any rate “Berries dye” is better, because it gives us a double sense. First we have the sense of the berries dying the ground with their juiciness, which follows naturally from the liveliness of the squirrels. But “Berries dye” also carries a double sense, through an obvious pun on dying, as in death. This adds a complication to the poem that deepens it considerably. Death is part of life. In death there is, paradoxically, life. In the first stanza you get the idea that life (the sun) leads to death (doom). In this stanza you get a similar idea. It’s a variation on the theme. Berries dye, then they die. The last line of the poem carries another variation on this same idea. Hemlock is a tree from which poison is extracted, the poison that famously killed Socrates. But it's also medicinal; it is used for breathing problems, swollen and painful joints, cramps and anxiety. It bends low, but towards the high.

      bowing hemlock

And perhaps you can even extend the idea of this dichotomy to squirrels playing too. Why do squirrels play? They play, chase each other around trees, in order to stay quick and nimble, which helps them in their attempt to escape being snatched up by birds of prey.

The poem begins with Doom, but ends with God. Doom, you might say, leads to God. Squirrels are eaten by birds of prey so they might play. Berries die so they might dye. Hemlock kills but also heals.  The shadow falls so that the sun can shine.

I like the way the D in this poem functions. Doom into Door into LaDDer into Done into Dream into Do into Dye into GoD. It is the doorway into the poem and the doorway out. The letter D, by the way, is in the shape of a door. The form of the letter originally derives from the early Egyptian pictograph indicating the folding door of a tent.

-/)dam Wade l)eGraff


I like the gloss David Preest has on this poem:

“This poem could be spoken by anyone beginning a completely new life, a nun entering her nunnery or a prisoner his prison, a woman entering upon marriage or any of us at death. If Emily applied the poem to herself, the ‘House without the Door’ was perhaps her seclusion from ordinary society and her commitment to a life of writing poetry. The second stanza recalls an incident in Rumer Godden’s novel In this House of Brede. An enclosed nun, having difficulties with her vocation, climbs the abbey tower from which ‘she could catch a glimpse of the town, of gardens, roofs, walls, windows....a shed, wheelbarrow, a hose, tools, sometimes a perambulator.’

Me from Myself — to banish —

Me from Myself — to banish —
Had I Art —
Impregnable my Fortress
Unto All Heart —

But since Myself — assault Me —
How have I peace
Except by subjugating
Consciousness?

And since We're mutual Monarch
How this be
Except by Abdication —
Me — of Me?


   -F709, J642, Fascicle 33, 1863

There are a few ways you can read the first stanza of this poem. The first two lines are relatively easy. They say something to the effect of, “I’d like to banish me from myself, if I had the art to do it.” Most of us understand this desire. We often get in our own way, especially when we become self-conscious. But then the 3rd and 4th line come in and the syntactic trouble starts. The dash after "Art" could be a comma or a period, depending on how you read it. Is the art of banishing the self meant to protect All Heart from the self, or to protect the self from All Heart? The entire poem depends on how you choose to punctuate those lines. Another tricky formulation is the use of the word “unto” in the 4th line. What’s that word doing? Again, your reading of the poem depends on how you read that preposition. 

After giving the lines much consideration, my best guess would be to read the first stanza as saying, "I would like to banish me from myself, if I had the art, but, alas, my fortress (my self-defenses) keep me from becoming All Heart."* 

When the poet declares she would banish herself from herself if she had the Art to do it, is she being humble? Is she admitting that she doesn't have this Art? Maybe. But in this poem Dickinson shows us that, in a way, she DOES have the Art to do it. She has the perfect medium for such a thing: poetry. A medium is the thing in the middle between the writer and the reader. In poetry, it's instructive to remember that the "I" is never just a signifier for the person of the poet. It is the reader’s "I" too. Dickinson, though she wrote the most private poetry ever written, also wrote for a general public. Through her "Art" she does manage to banish herself from herself. But of course this means she is also doing the inverse too, which is allowing other IN.

There are many ways you could define the "me" and the "myself" that this poem wrestles with, and it's instructive to read other analyses of this poem out there, as each of them attempts to come to terms with what these two "Monarchs" might be.** David Preest, for instance, says, confusingly, "Emily is both a soul or conscience or consciousness and a person." Indeed it is hard to write about this poem without being equally confusing. I don't know if Preest's term "soul" is the right one to use, but I do keep thinking about Yeats’ poem, “A Dialogue of Self and Soul” in tandem with this one. A dialogue between self and soul might be one way to characterize what is going on in this poem. 

Watch an illustration of the idea of this poem in dance by Maureen Fleming. 

For me the most instructive take-away from this poem is in thinking about the difficult necessity of subjugating consciousness in order to have peace. "How have I peace/ Except by subjugating/ Consciousness?" There are a thousand ways one might subjugate consciousness. There are potentially harmful ways, like drinking alcohol for instance, or watching mindless TV or doom scrolling on social media, etc. I suppose any addiction might be seen as a way to subjugate consciousness. But there are also healthy ways to do it. Pouring yourself into work might be one way, which, for a poet like Dickinson, would mean focusing on the poetry itself. Another art of consciousness-subjugation might be meditation, which for me has been a powerful one. I would say that subjugating consciousness is, indeed, a very good description of what meditation is. Your conscious mind rules you, willy nilly, but through meditation you can learn to get out from under the "assault" of your consciousness. When the mind stops ruling, then the heart is revealed. In other words you become "All Heart" when you make yourself impregnable to the constant assault of consciousness.  "Unto All Heart" -what a large phrase that is. All, meaning full, pure, everyone's. 

  -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

*Correction: Even though I really like this take on the poem, some new information has caused me to doubt it. Larry B, in the comments below, has pointed out the alternative line to "Unto All Heart" provided by Dickinson is "To foreign Heart." This means, to me, that Dickinson was indeed wishing she could shut heart OUT of the fortress of her mind, not shut her mind away from her heart. This makes sense, especially if we look at the dozens of poems preceding this one. She was heart-sore and wishing she could shut herself off from her beloved. This is a good example of how easy it is to bend a Dickinson poem to say what you want it to say instead of paying close attention to what it actually says. Part of the reason I was mislead was because it was hard for me to imagine that the same poet who could write, "When all Space has been beheld/ And all Dominion shown/ The smallest Human Heart’s extent/ Reduces it to none" would wish to protect herself from All Heart, but that iteration of Dickinson wouldn't arrive for a few more years. This one wished for peace. 

**Compare this poem to F693, a poem which seems to be about looking in a mirror, but could also be about looking into a lover's eyes. The “mutual Monarch” in this poem echoes the line “Neither would be a Queen” in that poem. In both poems there is a possible reading in which the other “me” is a lover, the way we sometimes see ourselves reflected in the eyes of another. Both selves (lovers) are Monarchs and reign. 

They put Us far apart—

They put Us far apart—
As separate as Sea
And Her unsown Peninsula—
We signified “These see”—

They took away our Eyes—
They thwarted Us with Guns—
“I see Thee” each responded straight
Through Telegraphic Signs—

With Dungeons—They devised—
But through their thickest skill—
And their opaquest Adamant—
Our Souls saw—just as well—

They summoned Us to die—
With sweet alacrity
We stood upon our stapled feet—
Condemned—but just—to see—

Permission to recant—
Permission to forget—
We turned our backs upon the Sun
For perjury of that—

Not Either—noticed Death—
Of Paradise—aware—
Each other’s Face—was all the Disc
Each other’s setting—saw—


     -F708, J474, Fascicle 33, 1863


This is one of those poems where you just have to throw your hands up and try to “see without seeing.” Seeing with your eyes closed (your eyes, in fact, taken) is what this poem seems to be about. So it’s appropriate that the poem, itself, is difficult to “see.” More on that idea later.

Let’s start with that opening stanza. “They put Us far apart—” Who are They? Immediately you are put in mind of lovers kept apart for a reason. For the past few dozen poems or so I’ve been inclined to think that the beloved “You” that these poems are addressed to was the reverend Charles Wadsworth. But there are a few clues in this poem that make me think this poem might be for Susan Gilbert. And, if it is, then maybe all the poems I was becoming convinced were addressed to Wadsworth were really addressed to Sue. I took those poems’ religious imagery as a clue leading to reverend Wadsworth, but maybe Sue was religious too? When Dickinson says in F707, “You served heaven/ or sought to,” I thought for sure it must be the good reverend Wadsworth that Dickinson was speaking to. But it could have also been Sue, right? Maybe Sue, who was married to Dickinson’s brother Austin, was attempting to keep her sacred wedding vows and therefore seeking to serve Heaven?

So while “They put us far apart” could refer to Wadsworth, since it would certainly have been socially inappropriate for Dickinson to be with a married Minister, I think it might more likely to refer to a lesbian relationship. The next lines give us another possible clue pointing toward Sue.

“They put Us far apart—/ as separate as Sea
And Her unsown Peninsula—/ We signified “These see”—”

I wondered what “unsown peninsula”might mean and so I reached out to Susan Kornfeld for her thoughts. I love her response: “Another look at 'unsown' and I find it interesting to note that Dickinson casts the Sea as feminine - which is traditional and typical for her; yet the peninsula is 'unsown' -- which would suggest a female, in fact a virgin -- or at least a woman who would not be pregnant -- which suggests a relationship with someone like ... Sue!”

Yes, this was my thought too, though Susan Kornfeld put it better than I could have. Susan also pointed out  that “it's hard to think about Sea and Her Peninsula being 'separate'. One envelops the other.” That’s insightful. The poem at first seems to be saying that the two were separated, but it's purposefully misleading. The poem is saying, rather, that in the poet’s reality “They” didn’t separate the two at all. Saying "As separate as Sea/ And Her unsown Peninsula—" is like saying "as separate as a hand in a glove." It's not separate at all. This tracks with the end of the poem too, in which even dungeons and death can’t keep the lovers apart, let alone "They". It also calls to mind poem F706 when the poet writes of the distance from her lover: “With just the Door ajar/ That Oceans are – “

“We signified “These see”—. What does "These" signify here? Does this line refer back to the sea and the peninsula? What Dickinson might be signifying is that what sees is not so much the eye as the sea and the peninsula. The peninsula is jutting into Her sea while the sea is enveloping Her peninsula. They are “seeing” each other in a deeper way. The sea sees.

“We signified “These see”—” sets up the next line, after the dramatic pause of the stanza break, “They took away our Eyes—” Because we signified that our bodies see one another, they are going to take away our ability to see one another in this way. And, just in case you don’t think this is serious, watch out. They are going to use guns to thwart us. Why are “They” going to use guns? Is Dickinson being metaphorical here, or is there a real threat of being shot and killed? And if so, for what? What would be a firing squad offense? Being lesbian might be one possibility, though I don’t think in Dickinson’s time it was against to the law to be so. 

Another possibility; those guns could be a reference to war. We saw something like this in F704, when Dickinson compared her defeat in love to losing a battle in war. Maybe the sea is meant here to signify the breadth of the U.S. That would make sense of the telegraph wires used for communication in the next lines. If this is the case, then Wadsworth comes back into the picture, as he was in San Francisco at the time. Questions abound. But let's get back to the point:

“I see Thee” each responded straight/ Through Telegraphic Signs—” This is a beautiful idea. Somehow, through electricity, through the air, through this very poem which Dickinson is telegraphing to us through time, we feel seen. The poet “Sees Thee.” Sees Thou.

And how about the fierce rebellion in the next lines?

With Dungeons—They devised—
But through their thickest skill—
And their opaquest Adamant—
Our Souls saw—just as well—

Our souls, even from dungeons on separate shores, using their thickest skill, and their opaquest adamant (determined will) will find a way to see, to be with, their beloved. What kind of telegraph message is that then, if not the one expressed by this poem?

Let’s look at those words “thickest” and “opaquest” for a moment. How “thick” is this poem? It’s the thickest. It shows Dickinson’s “skill” at its thickest. It’s dense, thick with meaning. And how opaque is it? Can you see through this poem? Hardly. Normally you see through things that are transparent. But here we are seeing, paradoxically, through the opaque. It reminds me of what William Blake must've meant when he wrote: “This life's dim windows of the soul/ Distorts the heavens from pole to pole/ And leads you to believe a lie/ When you see with, not through, the eye.”

Dickinson's poetry, her telegraph signal, is skillfully thick and willfully opaque, and this...allows us to see. The finer (most refined) sense gets through the tightest mesh.

They summoned Us to die—
With sweet alacrity
We stood upon our stapled feet—
Condemned—but just—to see—

Bearing witness to Dickinson’s declaration of a love so true that it would grant one happiness, “sweet alacrity”, even when being thwarted with guns, or left to die in a dungeon, or stapled to a cross, is such strong encouragement. Speaking of stapled to a cross, this poem isn’t the first time Dickinson has referred to herself in Christ-like terms. It’s well worth taking a look at F670 for one great example (out of dozens) pertaining to this idea. (F670 also mentions the peninsula motif too.)

Following this comes a whopper of a line. “Condemned—but just—to see—” Here you have a “thickening” of the plot, in which being condemned is somehow a part of the “seeing”. I don’t know if that’s right. I don’t know why being condemned would at all be necessary for seeing. But it’s an intriguing idea, and one worth thinking about. When you are condemned (damned), wouldn't you start to see more clearly?

And to go further with that idea, in the next stanza the plot thickens again as there seems to be a kind of willful self-condemnation happening:

Permission to recant—
Permission to forget—
We turned our backs upon the Sun
For perjury of that—

Maybe "They" isn't referring to the church condemning sexuality, or the congregation condemning love with a minister after all, but rather, "They" are Dickinson and the lover themselves, turning their own backs willfully against the Sun/Son. “We turned our backs upon the Sun” the poem says, for “perjury” of recanting. They would not recant their faith. This is invoking the martyr, one whom, at the point of torture and the threat of death, will not perjure his/herself and lie about his/her love for Jesus. Dickinson though, as she is wont to do, takes this Christian idea and brings it toward the Romantic realm.

Emily will go to the darkest place, turn away from the sun, toward what she calls the “White Sustenance / Despair –” for her love. Her bravery astounds, and her love is adamantly realized. She will die on the cross, happily, for her lover. And since this poem was left for us to find, then at some level we can can count our self as the one she is dying for. But there’s a catch. In this poem the "You" is up on a cross too. This dying for another isn't a one way sacrifice, as in Christian theology, it's mutual. There are two dying on the cross together, for each other, in sweet alacrity.

The last stanza, after all that passionate build-up, is just stunning:

Not Either—noticed Death—
Of Paradise—aware—
Each other’s Face—was all the Disc
Each other’s setting—saw—

Love doesn't notice death. This bears repeating. Love doesn't notice death. (Here we remember, and make deeper sense of, the poem that preceded this one in the fascicle, with its Giant which ignores flies. The Giant of Love does not notice the Flies of death.)

When you behold the face of your lover in your mind, then there is no Sun needed. All the disc that is needed is the beloved's face, the one which, in a previous poem, put out Jesus’ face. The beloved’s face replaces the Sun/Son. And each of you are seeing the other in splendor, as you set for each other. You are each other’s setting suns, dying for love.

Deep sigh.


-/)dam Wade I)eGraff

Size circumscribes—it has no room

Size circumscribes—it has no room
For petty furniture—
The Giant tolerates no Gnat
For Ease of Gianture—

Repudiates it, all the more—
Because intrinsic size
Ignores the possibility
Of Calumnies—or Flies.

   -F707, J641, Fascicle 33, 1863



"Size circumscribes." To circumscribe means to limit, or to define. So the size of something, say a room, defines what you can fit in that room. But Dickinson is getting at something more than just size here. "Size...has no room for petty furniture." Since there is only so much room in your room, you will want to maximize the space. You will want everything in that room to be worthy of being in that room. If you are an interior decorator, say, then you want every piece of furniture to be just right. Get rid of the petty furniture.

"Size circumscribes" is a very pithy and memorable way of saying that the form should fit content. If you have something to say, for instance, then say it in the best and most efficient way you can. Just as every piece of furniture should count in a room, so should every word count in a poem. And if possible, try to make each word count twice, or even thrice. Likewise, every note in a song or brush stroke in a painting should be perfectly placed.

But lest you think this about making the most of a small space, the next lines tell you that even within a giant space you still must be careful about keeping the gnats out. I take this as encouragement from Dickinson to go big if that's what your content requires.

And speaking of going big, it's ironic that Dickinson wrote this poem directly after F706, her longest poem ever. If you read the poems in order, as they are presented in the fascicle, this poem reads as an arch apologia for the previous poem. The poem I just wrote, she seems to be saying, is a behemoth, but I assure you every word is necessary. There is no wasted space.

"The Giant tolerates no Gnat/ For Ease of Gianture—" There are a couple alternatives for the latter line: "For simple Gianture" and "Because of Gianture". How about that word “Gianture." Did Dickinson make that up? Looks like it. And it’s a perfect word to describe her too. 

In the second stanza the idea of calumnies enter the poem. Calumnies are lies and slander. What should you do if your words evince slander? This poem is suggesting that you ignore it. And more than just ignore it, you should repudiate it!

That’s what I think this poem is saying. It's not warning you to beware of scandal so much as telling you to reject it out of hand. The first few times I read this poem I misread it. I took it as a warning not to get too big for your britches. I read it as saying keep to your own size. Don’t try to be such a giant, because if you get too big you won't be able to ignore the flies and lies. The bigger you get, the more you are susceptible. If you get too large, you lose track of your ability to keep track.

But eventually it clicked, as Dickinson poems eventually will, and I read it differently. I see it now as saying that INTRINSIC size, which is to say, the right size, a size which fits the content, is what you should be going for. You want a good fit, like Frank O’hara says in his great essay on Personism, "If you're going to buy a pair of pants you want them to be tight enough so everyone will want to go to bed with you."

This is a poem which tells us to go big if we are feeling big, but just make sure all the details count. Then ignore all the little annoyances and repudiate the inevitable malice and lies that come with the territory.

   -  /)dam Wade l)eGraff

                          
                          This is Emily's handwritten "possibility" from the
                          MS of this poem. That "ty" is a thing of beauty.
                          Where is the missing dot on that second "i"?

***

I’m really enjoying the diversity of this fascicle so far. We've had a poem about the joy of receiving a letter and reading it in private. Another taking on the persona of a bride anticipating her wedding night. We’ve had the tragic horrors of war writ large. We’ve had a long excuse to a lover for why they may not live together. And now we have this little brain teaser. After fascicle 32, with its intense focus on heaven and judgment, it feels like Dickinson is getting loose and experimenting with subject matter more in this one. Let's see where she goes from here! It's always an adventure with Emily. 

I cannot live with You –

I cannot live with You –
It would be Life –
And Life is over there –
Behind the Shelf

The Sexton keeps the Key to –
Putting up
Our Life – His Porcelain –
Like a Cup –

Discarded of the Housewife –
Quaint – or Broke –
A newer Sevres pleases –
Old Ones crack –

I could not die – with You –
For One must wait
To shut the Other’s Gaze down –
You – could not –

And I – could I stand by
And see You – freeze –
Without my Right of Frost –
Death's privilege?

They’d judge Us – How –
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

And were You lost, I would be –
Though My Name
Rang loudest
On the Heavenly fame –

And were You – saved –
And I – condemned to be
Where You were not –
That self – were Hell to Me –

So We must meet apart –
You there – I – here –
With just the Door ajar
That Oceans are – and Prayer –
And that White Sustenance –       (White) Exercise, Privilege
Despair –

      -F706, J640, Fascicle 33, 1863



This poem is unusually long for Dickinson and it got me curious as to what her longest poem might be. I looked it up and it turns out this IS her longest poem. Since Dickinson is a master of brevity, the length of this poem is, itself, worth considering.

The dozens of poems before this one, all seemingly addressed to one person, make it seem as if the absence of her beloved was something that was thrust upon her. But the first three stanzas of this poem leads one to reconsider and see that this despair was more likely, rather, chosen by Dickinson.

Why would someone choose despair? The poem goes to some -length- to explain why. The revelation for me though, the main takeaway, is that it is something chosen. Dickinson appears to choose despair, and, moreover, she takes sustenance from it.

What does Dickinson mean by her cryptic statement “I cannot live with You –/ It would be Life – " Why doesn’t the poet choose “Life”? One way to think about this question is to ask what she is choosing INSTEAD of life? She says that she rejects “life” because it is what the sexton keeps locked in the shelf like a cracked porcelain cup discarded by a housewife. There is a lot to unpack in that idea. A sexton is someone that looks after a church, and, often, a graveyard. Life is, paradoxically, like something dead, something precious like porcelain perhaps, but also something that gets old and cracks. Dickinson is looking for something that doesn’t get old, that won’t crack, something that can’t be replaced by a newer and more beautiful model. She conceives that this can be found in a kind of eternal love that is beyond life. (“Fleshless lovers” is the way she puts it in F691). It can also be found, you might say, in poetry itself. One may take the “You” in this poem for one’s self, and read it as an invitation to join the poet in this mystic place beyond decay.

 

It is worth noting the housewife in the analogy here. It is the housewife that is discarding the cup/life, but the implication is, conversely, that Dickinson is discarding the life of being a housewife. Also worth noting is the metaphor of the Sexton, because if “Life” is put away by the Sexton, it reminds us that living life is inextricable from death. You can’t have life without death. Dickinson is aiming for something more.

But the poet also says “I could not die – with You –”, for one must wait to shut the other’s eyes, and, for one thing, the “You” this poem is addressed to apparently couldn’t wait around to do this. “I could not die – with You – / For One must wait/ To shut the Other’s Gaze down – / You – could not – “. This speaks to the fact that no one can really die with someone else. Death, as Dickinson has pointed out in other poems, is a solitary thing. In F698 Dickinson calls this “Death’s single privacy”. 

In the lines that follow you see the depth of the poet’s love, “And I – could I stand by/ And see You – freeze – /Without my Right of Frost – /Death's privilege?” She is saying here, I believe, that she couldn’t watch her beloved freeze into rigamortis without doing so herself. It would be a “privilege” to freeze into death for the poet if she had to watch her beloved die. The stuttering beginning of this stanza (“And I – could I stand by”) is rare for Dickinson and brings the poem closer to spoken language than usual. In that moment’s pause you feel the anguish at the mere thought of the beloved’s death.

So both Life and Death with the beloved is off limits, but, then, so is resurrection. "Nor could I rise – with You – /Because Your Face/ Would put out Jesus’ – /That New Grace/ Glow plain – and foreign/ On my homesick Eye – /Except that You than He/ Shone closer by – “  These lines speak for themselves. Dickinson’s love for her beloved outshines Jesus. This is yet another example of Dickinson choosing a felt earthly love over an unknown heavenly one. This new Grace would be foreign to her and only make her feel homesick. (But what home we might ask? She has already told us she can’t Live with the beloved either.)

These lines may be seen as blasphemous, and most especially would have been so to the intended, who, we find out in the following lines, “served heaven”. “For You – served Heaven – You know,/ Or sought to – “ These lines indicate to me that Charles Wadsworth is very likely the “You” to whom this poem is addressed. See the gloss by Larry B (AKA Lawrence Barden) on the post for F686 for more on this: “At age 24, in 1855, ED attended a sermon delivered by Reverend Charles Wadsworth, a superstar, charismatic minister at Arch Street Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia. He was 16 years her senior and married with two children, but ED had found her soul mate. In the words of her niece, Martha Dickinson Bianci (1866-1943): 'Emily was overtaken – doomed once and forever by her own heart. It was instantaneous, overwhelming, impossible.'" 

Some conjecture this poem, indeed this series of poems, is addressed to Susan Gilbert, but I think Dickinson tips her hand when she says the addressee sought to serve heaven rather than be with her. And then she tips it again when she adds “Or sought to”. I take this pointed addition to indicate that either Wadsworth wasn’t convincing her in his service, or Dickinson wasn’t convinced there was such a thing as heaven to serve in the first place.

At any rate, the beloved chooses to serve heaven rather than be with Dickinson, and, as for Dickinson’s part, she says she would choose her beloved over a “sordid Paradise.” Sordid paradise is a very Dickinsonian oxymoron. As to why Dickinson might think paradise is “sordid,” see my comments on F695.

She opens this section with, “They’d judge Us – How – ." How could they judge Wadsworth? Afterall, he served heaven. And how could they judge Dickinson, for she values Wadsworth over heaven. It’s hard to judge someone who doesn't believe in the machinations of this sort of judgment. This fixation on judgment and heaven, though, is explored thoroughly in fascicle 32 and 33, as I point out in my comments on F699.

The next two stanzas go on to say that the poet would rather not be in heaven if her beloved was not there, even if she was the most famous citizen there. On the other hand, if he was in heaven and she was not, it would be as good as being in hell.

The poem ends with another oxymoron, the idea of the two lovers meeting apart. The door is open, but there might as well be an ocean between them. On the flip side, you might read this as saying that the breadth of the oceans between them is merely a door to walk through. This is how you "meet apart."

So We must meet apart –
You there – I – here –
With just the Door ajar
That Oceans are – and Prayer –
And that White Sustenance –
Despair –

I’m not sure what Dickinson means by the sustenance being the color white here. I think it likely means white hot, the way she uses it in “Dare you see a Soul at the "White Heat"? It’s worth noting that the two alternative words Dickinson provides for “Sustenance” are “Exercise” and “Privilege.” Both words add something important to the meaning. To think of despair as an exercise is instructive, and to think of it as a privilege even more so.

  

   -/)dam Wade l)eGraff  

I appreciate the poet Steven Cramer’s take on the last stanza of this poem. This is from an article on the poem in The Atlantic: “The final stanza seems to me one of the most overwhelmingly pained and resigned protests in verse. For Dickinson—the recluse who, paradoxically, valued personal attachments more highly than almost any other life experience—separation from a loved one amounts to Hell. The last six lines forsake the symmetry of the previous eleven quatrains, and desolation inheres in each syllable and juncture: in the choked finality of the heavy stresses and strong caesuras (“You there—I—here”); in the emotional abyss that opens with an enjambment (“With just the Door ajar/ That Oceans are”); in the oxymoronic precision of “meet apart” and “White Sustenance—/ Despair.” In this stanza and in hundreds of others, Dickinson resembles Shakespeare, one of the few other poets in English to achieve such a level of volcanic energy. To my mind and ear, no other American poet comes close.”

I am ashamed—I hide—

I am ashamed—I hide—
What right have I—to be a Bride—
So late a Dowerless Girl—
Nowhere to hide my dazzled Face—
No one to teach me that new Grace—
Nor introduce—my Soul—

Me to adorn—How—tell—
Trinket—to make Me beautiful—
Fabrics of Cashmere—
Never a Gown of Dun—more—
Raiment instead—of Pompadour—
For Me—My soul—to wear—

Fingers—to frame my Round Hair
Oval—as Feudal Ladies wore—
Far Fashions—Fair—
Skill to hold my Brow like an Earl—
Plead—like a Whippoorwill—
Prove—like a Pearl—

Then, for Character—

Fashion My Spirit quaint—white—
Quick—like a Liquor—
Gay—like Light—
Bring Me my best Pride—
No more ashamed—
No more to hide—
Meek—let it be—too proud—for Pride—
Baptized—this Day—a Bride—

    -F705, J473, fascicle 33, 1863 


One helpful way to read a poem is by shutting out sense, as much as possible, and just paying attention to rhythm and sound as you read it out loud. If you emphasize the iambic beat as you read, and keep it going in your head like a metronome, and listen to the way Dickinson plays off of the beat, the way she weaves words around it, you get a good foundation for the poem. Try giving voice to this one, making every dash a rest in the beat. Dickinson on percussion is like Buddy Rich. This one is a stellar example of Dickinson's musicality. In my opinion it is as good a composition of sound and sense as I have yet encountered.

In this poem, for starters, notice the emphatic beat on the hard D sound throughout. The poem begins and ends with it. How she works that D into the iambic meter is part of what makes the poem so satisfying to say. 

Rhyme is also turned up in this poem, even further than normal. Look at this wild run of triplet rhymes: “of Cashmere/ of Dun more/ Pompadour/ soul—to wear/ my Round Hair/ Ladies wore/ Fashions—Fair/ like an Earl/ Whippoorwill/ like a Pearl/ Character/ a Liquor." That’s just fun.

Amidst all of this sound, meaning sneaks in. The sense of the words, and the subsequent extrasensory sense of the words, begins to speak through this string of sounds. Through form comes content. That “D” sound comprises a feeling.  Before it has an assigned meaning the central word here, “bride”, has a sound. Dickinson makes the feeling of the word heard.

Whole words can give you a feeling. You can’t say the word pompadour, for instance, without feeling a little pompadour yourself, just as you can't say "whippoorwill" without intoning the song of the bird.

There was also, behind this poem, I suspect, a melody. I imagine this one was written to a tune going through Dickinson’s head, or maybe even while she was playing the piano. She reportedly played beautifully.

I tried playing a lilting Em/ G pattern on the guitar as I sang this poem, with a turn around at the end of each stanza, where I flipped the chords to G/ Em. It’s remarkable how much fun it is to sing. It sounds like a wedding jig.

***

It is a bit difficult to speak of ascribed meaning as it plays out in this poem because there are multiple ways of reading it. The first and foremost reading of this poem, for me, is as an innocent expression of the intense complex of feelings of a bride on her first night of being married; the crazy mix of fear, sadness, joy, excitement, embarrassment, self-admiration, happiness, inebriation and then finally, resolve.

One thing notable about a poem such as this one is how absolutely personal it is, and yet, at the same time, how universal. This poem could be spoken by ANY bride in love. Likewise the reader is transformed into a bride as he or she reads the poem out loud, and perhaps into a husband as well. It could hardly be a more intimate poem, nor a more public one.

Read this way, this is among Dickinson’s happiest poems. There is only the barest hint of sadness, and only a modicum of fear. Mostly there is deep character. That’s what this poem seems to be about, in the end. The poet chooses, by the close of the poem, to have too much pride to have pride, and covers up in bridal white. But, astonishingly, before she does, she let’s us see, in the intimate revelations of this poem, behind the bridal veil. We are, in this way, like the groom.

I swoon when I read this poem. It is so romantic. And yet, sometimes when I read it, it is the antithesis of romance. It is about autonomy. This is simultaneously a marriage poem and a poem about independence. This is yet another way this poem is both public and private. It reminds me of a line from the great Bill Callahan song "Pigeons": "When you get married, you marry the whole world."

***

There is much more to say about this poem. Each line could engender discussion. Just the idea of being too proud to be proud is thought-provoking enough to make this poem a keeper. Another line I find worth noting is "Prove—like a Pearl—", which could stand by itself as an epigram. It sums up Dickinson's entire oeuvre. Enclosed in her oyster shell of a life, Dickinson certainly did prove like a Pearl. 

-/)dam Wade l)eGraff

-

"As you wish."

My Portion is Defeat – today –

My Portion is Defeat – today –
A paler luck than Victory –
Less Paeans – fewer Bells –
The Drums dont follow Me –
with tunes –
Defeat – a +somewhat slower –
means –
More +Arduous than Balls –

Tis populous with Bone
and stain –
And Men too straight to
+ stoop again –
And Piles of solid Moan –
And Chips of Blank – in
Boyish Eyes –
And + scraps of Prayer –
And Death’s surprise,
Stamped visible – in stone –

There’s +somewhat prouder,
Over there –
The Trumpets tell it to
the Air –
How different Victory
To Him who has it – and
the One
Who to have had it,
would have been
Contenteder – to die –

+something dumber + difficult –

+bend +shreds + something

    -F704, J639, Fascicle 33, 1863

This poem takes a surprising turn. Nearly every poem in the last few fascicles seems to be dealing with the aftermath of a lover’s absence, full of an anguished passion which is wrung out in metaphor after metaphor. So when this one starts out by claiming “My Portion is Defeat – today –”, you think it is one more poem bemoaning the absence of He who brings the fire, He who is full of grace, He with eyes like heaven. And perhaps it is.

In the next line the pivotal word “Victory” leads us to see war as the metaphor for whatever defeat is in question for the poet. This defeat feels, to the poet, as brutal and terrible as war: pure hell. Is this an exaggeration? Perhaps, but it makes its point. 

This is problematic. On one hand it elevates the emotional impact of whatever defeat the poet is feeling. On the other hand doesn't it belittle the fate of the soldiers by comparing it to a personal defeat?

But something strange happens. The problem works itself out. In the course of this poem, as Dickinson goes on to describe the horrors of war, like the “solid pile of moan” and “chips of blank in boyish eyes”, it swerves to become more about the poor soldiers than the poet. It’s as if the poet, who is admitting that she is so miserable she’d rather be dead, is now, because of her plight, able to truly sympathize with the soldiers. The poem starts out in self-pity, but as the metaphor gets extended there is a transition until finally the metaphor itself begins to become the subject. The poet moves from pitying herself to pitying the civil war soldiers who are dying en masse as this poem is being written, including some of Emily's own friends.

It reminds me in this way of Sylvia Plath’s poem “Daddy”, in which Plath is ostensibly expressing anger about her German father, but does this by comparing her father with a Nazi soldier. Plath's poem was controversial, as some saw it as sensational and opportunistic  (The gall of comparing your own privileged life to the horrors of the holocaust!) I can understand this, but I would argue that you can justify Plath’s move as a way of shedding light on domestic abuse, and, conversely, the parental abuse hinted at in poem sheds light on Nazi mentality too.

This poem has a bit of that same problem. In Dickinson’s poem though I feel as if she channels her suffering into empathy. Note that the poem never returns to its initial focus on “me.” In the end the pronoun “me” has been turned into “one.” It has been depersonalized. The soldier and the poet, through the alchemy of the poem, have become “one”.

Let's go through the poem.

First stanza: My portion is defeat today. I didn’t get as lucky as the victor did. For me there are less songs of triumph (paeans), less ringing of bells, and no marching drums at all. To be defeated is more difficult than death by bullets (balls).

Second stanza: Defeat is populated with the bones of soldiers and the stain of blood, with dead bodies so stiff they can no longer stoop, with piles of men moaning in pure agony, with dead boys who now have blank chips for eyes. (“chips” -what a word choice.) The dead boys are holding scraps of prayer, perhaps bible pages. (This is as biting a line about faith as Dickinson has yet written.) And then there is that final haunting image; the way the faces of the dead still show the surprise of death, as if the soldiers were statues carved in stone.

Third stanza: Those over there on the victorious side are “somewhat” prouder than the defeated are. Dickinson provides “something” as an alternative word for “somewhat” here, but I think “somewhat” is much stronger, because it implies that there is still SOME pride in defeat. There is still a minor victory. This is a subtle turning point in the poem and sets up the next lines. "Over there –/ The Trumpets tell it to the Air – " The trumpets of the winners tell their victory to the air. The trumpets are not being heard by anything but “air” though, implying that the victory is as empty as air. Still, empty as it may be, victory is still better, because it doesn’t make you wish you were dead. The defeated soldier would rather have died in battle than lost a cause he was willing to give his life for. And here we are reminded of the stakes for the poet too. She would rather be dead than to have lived without gaining the thing she would have given her entire being for.

This poem, which is, at the onset, about the poet, turns out to be one of the great anti-war poems through sheer force of Dickinson’s imagery.

There is also a unique and effective rhyme scheme and rhythmic structure. Read the poem and listen to it as if there were marching drums underlining it, with a pause in the beat of the snare at every dash. 

-/)dam Wade l)eGraff