A Doubt if it be Us

A Doubt if it be Us
Assists the staggering Mind
In an extremer Anguish
Until it footing find -

An Unreality is lent,
A merciful Mirage
That makes the living possible
While it suspends the lives.

     -F903, J859, 1865


It seems clear to me that, for the most part, Dickinson purposely made her poems all-purpose, one size fits all. This one, for example, carries a very general idea, one we can all fit to our own situations: all of us struggle with doubts and insecurities about belonging and being accepted, and all of us find some kind of comfort in a fantasy that helps us deal with this and go on with life. Our doubts lead us to our illusions.

That thought is a gift from Emily. It is worth thinking about. What constitutes the merciful mirage for you? Are you suspending your real life in a fantasy? 

It’s mind-boggling to think about how many ways there are to apply this maxim. Here's one. I recently heard that Gen Z was the “parasocial” generation. I asked my 16 year old daughter Sofia what Parasocial meant. She said it basically meant a one-sided relationship with celebrities on social media.* The rise of AI “friends" is another pertinent example. In both cases real Lives are being suspended. There are countless ways to suspend reality.

Okay, let’s take a deep dive into the poem.

A Doubt if it be Us

We can apply this poem in our own particular way, but still one is always deeply curious what the poem meant to Dickinson. It’s hard to say what the impetus of this poem was though. The word “Doubt” suggests the anguish of not being a "believer." Dickinson’s struggle with her self-exclusion from the church can be seen in many of her letters and poems.

But there might be another genesis for this poem. The word “Us” may point to a relationship. 

If this poem is about love, in the romantic sense of the term, then one wonders what the unreal mirage was that Dickinson escaped to? Who, are what, is the mirage for Dickinson?

Could it have been poetry? Or maybe it was a good novel? “Unreality is lent,” we read, and suddenly we think of a library. Fiction is lent to us from the library. What else could be lending this Unreality? What does it mean that it is lent to us? Are we finding the mirage or is the mirage finding us?

That makes the living possible
While it suspends the lives.

Note the contrasting meanings of “living” and “lives” here. It’s a paradox. How is “living” possible if the “lives” are suspended? The false kind of life, the unreal mirage, isn’t really LIVING.  Instead, it suspends real life.  

“Suspends” is a super interesting word. It has a double meaning. The Unreal mirage suspends our lives, somehow keeps them afloat, but it also causes us to suspend, or put off, really living.

I also hear an echo in this poem of the phrase that was coined by the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge in his 1817 work Biographia Literaria, which I'm sure Dickinson must have read: "that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith."

We suspend our disbelief, so that we may live. But deep down? We can't believe it.

   -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

*I found this insightful, from First Things:

“Parasocial relationships, ersatz intimacies, are shaping Gen Z in ways we are only beginning to understand. From the rise of finstas (secondary Instagram accounts where users post more personal, unfiltered content) to ceaseless online commentary lamenting the paucity of real-life relationships, it’s clear that Gen Z craves authenticity and connection. And yet members of Gen Z are more likely than those of older generations to bail on commitments and reflexively distrust the very peers they long to connect with. This simultaneous craving for, and retreat from, the real is symptomatic of a crisis of belonging.”

Too little way the House must lie

Too little way the House must lie
From every Human Heart
That holds in undisputed Lease
A white inhabitant—

Too narrow is the Right between—
Too imminent the chance—
Each Consciousness must emigrate
And lose its neighbor once—


     -F902, J911, 1865

Dickinson often does a funny thing where she speaks of her subject in a purposefully indirect way.

House…undisputed Lease…white inhabitant…Right…emigrate…neighbor? For a minute I thought this poem had something to do with white property owners and immigrant rights. That wouldn't be a very Dickinsonion theme though so we are suspect. Sure enough, with a closer reading, this line of thought appears to be a ruse. It seems as if the poem purposely misdirects you. 

This misdirection does a few things. First, I think it is a way of making a meta-commentary on both the subject and the metaphor. It adds a layer of meaning and gives a deeper dimensionality to the poem. (For instance, to follow one possible thread of thought, I think the metaphor in this poem may be making a subtle side-swipe at the narrow-mindedness of the rich in the line, "Too narrow is the Right between—").

Another thing about this misdirection is that, though frustrating, it adds to the power of the poem to pull you in. That puzzle-loving part of us is awakened. We want to see the puzzle, and therefore the poem, completed. But Emily doesn't make it easy. 

After a few readings of the poem, paying attention to all of the clues at our disposal, we come to the conclusion that House means grave. Once we see this, then “white inhabitant” becomes "corpse." Okay, we have a starting point. 

Too little way the House must lie
From every Human Heart

Life is short and the grave is close. The Human Heart brings in the idea of life-force, but also, love.

That holds in undisputed Lease
A white inhabitant—

Does "That" refer to the Human Heart or the grave? Both, perhaps. Both hold a body in undisputed Lease; the Heart in memory, and the grave in physical residence. 

Death as a permanent undisputed lease is a provocative idea. The idea of paying “rent” here has a dark humor. It makes me think, in contrast to an undisputed lease, about how difficult it is to pay rent when you are living. Your rent is always in “dispute” when you are alive.

Too narrow is the Right between—

This line seems to further the “Too little way” in the first line. If it does, then it means something like: our life-time is too narrow between birth and death. In this case, we have a kind of “Right” to life, though it is a very limited one. It also carries the sense of "Right now." This is your in-between, don't miss it.

The line could also easily mean the “narrow” space in the ground, the space of the grave, where the body has its lease. In this case “Right” could mean a number of other possible things, the "Right" to be dead, for instance. More dark humor.

It’s a bit mind-boggling how Dickinson pulls off simultaneous readings. Does the "narrow... between" refer to time or space? And, if so, why is it "Right" between?

Too imminent the chance—

What Dickinson means by “chance” here is pretty hard to pin down too. It might mean something like the “chance” to really live while we still can. This is the reading I prefer. I suppose this exposes my optimistic idealism, because there's another way to read the line. If the thing that is imminent is the House (grave), then it might also be referring to the chance of death. Death is the imminent chance. To think of death as a chance is darkly funny too. It's not a chance, but a certainty.

There is another option I can think of for the meaning of "Chance" here, which is introduced in the next lines about emigrating. "Chance" could refer to escaping the grave after death, the chance of the spirit being released into Paradise. If so, there is perhaps the suggestion that there is something we can do to increase that chance. 

Each Consciousness must emigrate
And lose its neighbor once—

These lines could mean that since our consciousness must emigrate to the house of the grave, we should embrace our neighbors while we can. 

But, following the other track of meaning, these lines could mean that each consciousness must (should) emigrate from the grave to Paradise and lose the neighborhood of corpses it once had.

Both meanings have power.  

The “once” at the end of the poem is poignant. It could mean that we only get "once" to be here, only one go around. But if you take “death” as the “Right” in this poem, then the “once” refers to the joy of leaving this earth and going to paradise, like in the old spiritual: "Some bright morning when this life is over, I'll fly away."

I far prefer the former reading, the one which seems to say to us, "Take the chance of life while you can." But the latter reading, the wish to emigrate from the House of the grave to the spirit in the sky may be more in line with Dickinson’s meaning.

On top of this, there is still that subtext about white inhabitants and emigrating at play in the subtext of this poem, whatever we are to make of that.

      -/)dam Wade l)eGraff