the prowling Bee: I sometimes drop it, for a Quick

I sometimes drop it, for a Quick –
The Thought to be alive –
Anonymous Delight to know –
And Madder – to conceive –

Consoles a Wo so monstrous
That did it tear all Day,
Without an instant’s Respite –
‘Twould look too far – to Die –

Delirium – diverts the Wretch
For Whom the Scaffold neighs –
The Hammock’s motion lulls the Heads
So close on Paradise –

A Reef – crawled easy from the Sea
Eats off the Brittle Line –
The Sailor doesn't know the Stroke –
Until He’s past the Pain –

-FR784, J708, fascicle 37, 1863

This one gets me immediately with that first line. What is being dropped? Woe itself, assuredly. Though it could also be a goal. I dropped the drudgery of my goal for a Quick (blank.) Quick could be a noun, in which case it means “Life’ or it could be an adjective without a referent. In other words, something gets dropped before the sentence even comes to an end. It gets dropped quickly!

What else could you say is being dropped? The Martyrdom? The Renunciation? (This idea comes from the poem about renunciation preceding this one in the fascicle.)

The “it” being dropped in that first line stands for something difficult, something painful.

Drop it for a "Quick." A quick what, Emily? A quick fix? A quickie? A quick thought of being alive. It’s almost like she’s talking quickly out loud here, jumping ahead of her own thoughts, the way she elides the object of the sentence and picks it up in the next line. You can imagine it as spoken dialogue. If this were dialogue then the dashes might function as little questions in the pattern of speech: “I sometimes drop it, for a Quick (a quick what?) The Thought to be alive (why?) Anonymous Delight to know (but) and madder to conceive (What even is life? It seems crazy.)"

Each line is so redolent with meaning. But the basic gist is, you feel like dropping something difficult and painful for some quick fix, some easy way out.

Just have a quick little fix of whatever drug you need. Whatever diversion. What is your drug of choice? Emily uses...

The Thought to be alive -

This line stands on its own, as a complete thought. You really can’t ever get past it completely. The thought to be alive. To be alive is the “quick,” if we take the definition of quick as a noun. Life.

I mean, really stop and think about that line. It's heady.

Now feel that line in counterweight to what it is that is dropped: Woe. Whoa.

Anonymous Delight to know–

That word anonymous there is so packed. Why is Delight anonymous? Think of it as opposed to Woe. If

delight is anonymous, then Woe is personal. If anonymous Delight is heady, then Woe is hearty.

Why is Delight anonymous? Because delight doesn’t care. When I am in a state of pure delight I am disconnected from the suffering of my fellow beings. I’m anonymous. It's wonderful in its way. And perhaps even necessary from time to time. But it's ultimately empty. It’s only in relation with other that we become Somebody. But in relation comes, by necessity, Woe.

What is the Delight? There are probably as many forms as there are types of people. But in this case, it is the mere thought of being alive. Being alive is an experience being translated into feeling, and then into thought, and then, perhaps, into words on a page.

And Madder – to conceive –

Look at this line in isolation. It’s mad to conceive. What does it mean to conceive? Conceive may refer to "Thought," as in the line before it, but it also has the sense of "Birth." (It's strange that birth and thought share the same word, no? That thought itself is a strange conception!) The two senses of the word "Conception" seem to come together here. Dickinson ties the two ideas, of thought and life, into this one word.

And Madder – to conceive – There is something a little mad about this line. It’s almost Shakespearean the way it turns in on itself. The thought of what life really is will drive you mad. Why? It makes you really question why.

The madness also points AWAY from the sanity, because sanity seems to be found in the woe. Woe is found in our connection with others.

(I was having a conversation with students today over the way people bond through complaining. I was reminded of this poem, and an earlier one in this fascicle, FR780, which is about two women who are wed through the bond of their grief.)

Now we are now set up for the second stanza. This quick diversion consoles...

Consoles a Wo so monstrous
That did it tear all Day,
Without an instant’s Respite –
‘Twould look too far – to Die –

To have anonymous delight in being alive consoles us. We need it. Because the monstrous woe, which would be the loss of the beloved, can be so great that without an “Instant’s respite” we would want to kill ourselves, because “‘Twould look too far to die.”

I like that word “Instant” in there. Instantaneous gratification. As opposed to the work of woe, which is part of the drudgery, part of thing you wish to drop.

Delirium – diverts the Wretch
For Whom the Scaffold neighs –
The Hammock’s motion lulls the Heads
So close on Paradise –

Delirium is that mad happiness, that drug high, that gives some instant respite to the wretch "For Whom the Scaffold neighs–" I hear the line “For whom the bell tolls,” by John Donne here. (I would guess Emily was familiar with that poem.)

But for whom the scaffold neighs is…nightmarish. The scaffold, which is murdering the self for…being a murderer! sounds like a horse neighing, a horse rearing before galloping to hell. It creates a disturbing and surreal image. Neigh also sounds like Nay. The scaffold nays.

But remember, in this poem the neighing scaffold appears to be a punishment the poet wishes to willingly face! It’s akin to the cross. The mad delirious fun is a diversion from what really matters, which is the damned who are dying in distress.

The Hammock’s motion lulls the Heads
So close on Paradise –

The Quick fix is like the hammock’s motion lulling the Heads. It’s hard to know what those hammocks are doing there at first read, but the association is with boats. This is a sailor lying in the hammock. The waves are rocking him to sleep. The motion lulls. If the sailor was not lulled to sleep, he would be able to navigate the shoals and get to land. He let himself be lulled (drugged) to his own demise, and that of his crew.

The poem flips here I think. The first half of the poem seems to say, you need a diversion now and then to keep from killing yourself. The final stanza though, says to get back on watch! Don’t let your fellows be sacrificed on the gallows. Don’t let the ship be wrecked.

A Reef – crawled easy from the Sea

Eats off the Brittle Line –

At first I thought the first line meant that a sailor or someone to save the sailor is crawling up onto the reef. And the brittle line was a rope that was being eaten by the coral.

But upon further reading I’m inclined to think that the Reef is personified as something that so easily can crawl up and cause us to wreck. Perhaps a fling? Is it an affair we are “dropping” our burden for? It is some kind of addiction. That's the the reef that crawls so easily from the sea.

“Eats off the brittle line” is, itself, a brittle line. The brittle line in the context of this poem, as I read it, is the line reaching of safety being offered from the shore, but also the line between life and death. The coral gnaws through this fragile life-line, and the sailor dies in the wreck, which, of course, could have been avoided if he kept on his watch.

The Sailor doesn't know the Stroke –
Until He’s past the Pain –

The sailor doesn’t know the stroke (of death) until he’s past the pain. I imagine him drunk, happily swaying in his cot as the ship hits the coral, dreaming of the pleasures of the South Seas. He relaxed his guard and now the whole crew is lost.

Heavy.

-/)dam Wade l)eGraff