The Lady feeds Her little Bird

The Lady feeds Her little Bird
At rarer intervals—
The little Bird would not dissent
But meekly recognize

The Gulf between the Hand and Her
And crumbless and afar
And fainting, on Her yellow Knee
Fall softly, and adore—


        -F925, J941, sheet 13, 1865


When researching this poem I came across a post on Instagram that asked for interpretations of it. The first one was admirably succinct:

“Humble Acceptance in face of retreat of time or affection.”

Emily gives us this idea in the guise of a charming allegory. It begins with... The Lady... 

This Lady could be Emily’s best friend Sue, or it could be Lady Fortune, or even Mother Nature. (It’s probably not the Virgin Mary though, since you don't picture Her forgetting about you.) This Lady is regal, but fickle. We don't know anything else about her except that she has a yellow knee. Why yellow? Is yellow the color of the Lady's dress, or of Her skin? Is yellow meant in a more cosmic way, like the color of the Sun or Moon?

In the first line this yellow Lady, who we imagine is dressed in fine regalia, is feeding her little pet Bird. 

Then line two drops a bomb. The Bird (the poet) is getting fed by The Lady at rarer and rarer intervals. The Lady, it would appear, seems to be forgetting about her little bird. Perhaps the bird no longer amuses her. Perhaps she has other interests? 

We’ve all been there. For whatever reason the person we admire who is paying attention to us begins to do so less and less. We lose favor.

What's a girl to do? She does something unexpected and transformative.

The little Bird would not dissent
But meekly recognize

The Bird would not dissent. A double-negative. Dissent is a funny word to use here too. Dissent means “to publicly disagree with an official rule or a popular idea.” Private feelings may be another matter.

What is being meekly recognized?

The Gulf between the Hand and Her

It’s an acknowledgement of how far the Bird, in its poverty, is from the Lady. But the trippy thing about this line is that the distance is between the "Hand" of the Lady and "Her," the Lady. It's as if the hand is still feeding the bird, but the arm is elastically stretching further and further. In other words, the distance begins to happen before the loving stops. 

And crumbless and afar
And fainting,

The ghosted poet feels bereft. And yet, dying, the little song-bird will... 

Fall softly, and adore—

The image of the fainting bird falling softly to its death is a sad one, yet there is a levity here. The bird is falling softly. And the reason the bird is falling so softly is because she is being held aloft in her adoration of the Lady.

Fall softly, and adore—

What a beautiful line. It has a hymn-like tone to it, almost religious, except that there's a twist; the merciful He is here a merciless She. 

The usual narrative is "Hell hath no fury like a woman spurned," but Dickinson upends that expectation. Instead of anger, she is "falling softly, and adoring." It's a monumental shift. The poet can love without being loved in return. 

There is a William Blake poem that is apropos here: "The Angel that presided o’er my birth/ Said, “Little creature, form’d of Joy and Mirth,/ “Go love without the help of any Thing on Earth.” That's what the little bird is doing here with her song, loving with her own inner strength.

       -/)dam Wade l)eGraff

Lesbia and her Sparrow by Edward Poynter

Notes: Dickinson's poem may be riffing off of Catullus’ 1st century BC poems about his lover Lesbia and her pet bird. She likely knew them from studying Latin in school.  Here’s an interesting take on them. And here’s the poem.

Sparrow, my Lady's pet,
with whom she often plays and holds to her chest,
to whom she gives her fingertip as you peck away,
and whose sharp bites she likes to provoke
whenever it pleases her
to play some dear little game
(it’s a small relief for her longing, 
so that her passion might quiet down).
Oh – if only I could play with you as she does,
and alleviate the troubles of my melancholy mind!