tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post7415899570346502602..comments2024-03-29T00:07:13.458-07:00Comments on the prowling Bee: The first Day's Night had come – Susan Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-22874907243988110982023-08-18T14:44:59.079-07:002023-08-18T14:44:59.079-07:00Usually, when ED says such-and-such is true, I bel...Usually, when ED says such-and-such is true, I believe her. However, if she wanted to protect someone she loves from unwanted identification, I wouldn’t put it past her to lie. The pain expressed in this poem feels too immediate to have occurred “∙∙∙∙∙Years ago – that Day –”. <br /><br />I suspect the two painful events happened September 1861 when she first learned that Wadsworth was considering moving to San Francisco (L261 to Higginson, 25 April 1862, “I had a terror-since September) and June 1, 1862, when Wadsworth sailed from New York. During that interval she tried to come to terms with her loss by increasing physical seclusion at Homestead, dedicating her life to poetry, and wearing only white as a symbol of her faithfulness to him, whom she never expected to see again in this life. <br /><br />ED's neighbors were convinced she had sunk into madness, and she wonders if maybe they’re right.Larry Bhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02810899482852120751noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-28600643869470554242020-06-20T18:08:03.644-07:002020-06-20T18:08:03.644-07:00There are lots of capitalized words in the poem an...There are lots of capitalized words in the poem and I don't know that the capitalization of 'Soul' means anything different than the others. That begs the question of why so many of the nouns are upper case. It might be more interesting to look at the nouns that aren't capitalized.Susan Kornfeldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-17632819744475089092020-06-16T10:19:37.077-07:002020-06-16T10:19:37.077-07:00Why is the word ‘Soul’ starting with a capital let...Why is the word ‘Soul’ starting with a capital letterAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10532699247175858992noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-67956570083883284112020-04-01T17:12:18.350-07:002020-04-01T17:12:18.350-07:00Dickinson is speaking in the voice of the eternal....Dickinson is speaking in the voice of the eternal. Perhaps it takes joining her there by summoning up your own deep experiences with death to respond to her own voice from the grave.w3cubedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03378277134596659028noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-5953623961040128922013-09-24T17:25:40.423-07:002013-09-24T17:25:40.423-07:00Some how this poem doesn't speak to meSome how this poem doesn't speak to meAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-78932656034820952842013-03-21T10:57:02.774-07:002013-03-21T10:57:02.774-07:00Thanks for replying. I am certainly one of the pe... Thanks for replying. I am certainly one of the people who turn to ED. She opened me up to poetry altogether.<br /><br /> Again, thanks for this blog. I appreciate the discipline and your willingness to share insights. You have helped me to break into a number of difficult poems. I now have you on my "favorites" page and look forward to reading more! Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-5406879719804596002013-03-20T09:52:30.640-07:002013-03-20T09:52:30.640-07:00Thanks for this insight. Re-reading the poem I see...Thanks for this insight. Re-reading the poem I see your point about the fourth stanza. It can indeed be read as an epiphany. I also agree that "helplessness" is not the right word. Dickinson may well be pointing back to an epiphany as the beginning of her "divinest sense" of poetry as you suggest. <br /> Yet I do find a depth of grieving for the torment, the snapped strings and blown bow of the soul. I take her at her word that things were "terrible" and that a further "horror" befell. <br /> I am reminded of "The Soul has bandaged Moments" (http://bloggingdickinson.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-soul-has-bandaged-moments.html) where after a brief escape the soul is recaptured:<br /><br />The Soul's retaken moments—<br />When, Felon led along,<br />With shackles on the plumed feet,<br />And staples, in the Song,<br /><br />The Horror welcomes her, again,<br />These, are not brayed of Tongue—<br /><br /><br />So perhaps there weren't two griefs in the sense of episodes, but simply times of torment or existential horror. Dickinson's poetry emerges and transcends -- and people like us all over the world read it and read it and read it. <br /><br />Susan Kornfeldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-3358172957373104902013-03-20T08:42:08.896-07:002013-03-20T08:42:08.896-07:00This is one of my favorite of ED's poems. I p... This is one of my favorite of ED's poems. I particularly like the reversal of the normal convention of day representing safety and night fear and danger. Here, the day is "terrible" and night is cause for rejoicing and healing. <br /><br /> I don't think that the poem refers to two griefs -- or even to grief at all, except perhaps as grief is a focusing of the pain and impermanence that life represents. Day is a symbol for life and night, death or sleep where the rational mind relaxes. The poem considers the circle of pain that life represents.<br /><br /> The fourth stanza is magical. It is here where the mind transcends convention and breaks through to a way of perceiving that is not limited to self and things that are impermanent. It is similar to the moment when the "plank in reason" breaks and the mind opens to a more profound understanding.<br /><br /> The moment is years ago -- the poem recalls an epiphany, perhaps where ED woke to her calling as a poet and first experienced poetry that can transcend convention and convey what is ineffable. The description of that experience is joyful, humorous and humbling (I "mumbled -- like a fool").<br /><br /> She is without reference point in that moment and questions whether this is madness -- and it is from a conventional point of view. But I expect she would find it the type of madness that is also "divinest sense". <br /><br /> I love your blog -- but I had to comment on this poem. I am astonished that you think that this is a poem whose "effect is sad" and I don't see where you find "helplessness" in facing "upheaval of the heart and soul". There is nothing helpless about the writer of this poem. The poem is all about transcendence and joy. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com