tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post8736796307773147341..comments2024-03-28T11:04:36.401-07:00Comments on the prowling Bee: A still — Volcano — Life —Susan Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-86673640997617868422023-11-01T15:37:04.125-07:002023-11-01T15:37:04.125-07:00ED wrote eleven “volcano” poems: F165, F207, F425,...ED wrote eleven “volcano” poems: F165, F207, F425, F517, F764, F1161, F1429, F1472, F1691, F1703, F1776, and four “bomb” poems: F360, F522, F622, F1150. In many of them the volcano/bomb is a secret ED must keep bottled because she thought its revelation would destroy lives of her family. <br /><br />‘A still — Volcano — Life’ is one of those poems, its last stanza particularly direct about consequences of spilling her beans. But, she cannot keep completely silent, and so, she tells the truth, but tells it slant, leaving us to guess:<br /><br />“The lips that never lie —<br />Whose hissing Corals part — and shut —<br />And Cities — ooze away —”<br /><br />And then there’s ED’s Master Letter 2: <br /><br />“Vesuvius dont talk--Etna dont-- one of them--said a syllable--a thousand years ago, and Pompeii heard it, and hid forever--She could'nt look the world in the face, afterward, I suppose--Bashful Pompeii!” (L233, about late 1861).<br /><br />There were other ingredients in ED’s gnawing lifelong angst, but one was the truth about her relationship with Sue during their late teens and early twenties. Given the pain caused by the later affair of Austin and Mabel Todd, ED probably should have spilled her beans. The Dickinson family would have survived.<br />Larry Bhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02810899482852120751noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-34661658332733644812023-10-03T12:29:07.434-07:002023-10-03T12:29:07.434-07:00Beautiful gloss, very helpful. The north/south div...Beautiful gloss, very helpful. The north/south divide. The double meaning of lips. The thought of "poetry" itself, oozing away cities. <br /><br />I love the "too subtle to suspect" as applied to the poetry. The most subtle of poets, and yet, watch out!<br /><br />I like the volcano interrupts the "still life" in the first line. That seems to me to be the poem in miniature. d scribehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08242682202760522439noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-82553204488965590772022-11-18T20:14:17.450-08:002022-11-18T20:14:17.450-08:00Thanks for this!Thanks for this!Susan Kornfeldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-21817795735734483192022-11-18T08:32:20.839-08:002022-11-18T08:32:20.839-08:00"She is writing at night where her poetic sig..."She is writing at night where her poetic sight is clearest and where others won't get a glimpse of the hot light she keeps damped within."<br /><br />ED was probably a morning person. In her early letters she complains that her dawn to dusk schedule of cooking, cleaning, and keeping house leaves no time for poetry. <br /><br />Apparently, about 1858, she negotiated a deal with her father, Edward, giving her the morning hours for writing. ED’s wrote a brief thank-you note, ‘To my Father’ (L198), followed by a poem, ‘Sleep is meant to be’ (F35). She gave the note to her father and a copy to Susan Dickinson, perhaps as a FYI.<br /><br />Johnson Letter #198 <br /><br />“To my Father -<br />to whose untiring efforts <br />in my behalf, I am in - <br />debted for my morning-hours <br />viz 3. AM to 12. PM. <br />these grateful lines are <br />inscribed by his aff<br /><br /> Daughter.”<br /><br />Manuscript at Houghton Library, Harvard: <br />http://archive.emilydickinson.org/working/hb127.htm <br /><br />Johnson’s notes, Houghton Library, Harvard, Emily Dickinson's Correspondences with Susan Dickinson:<br />http://archive.emilydickinson.org/working/nhb127.htm <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-65512365407754558682015-12-06T12:15:35.508-08:002015-12-06T12:15:35.508-08:00I explain in the lines following that one. The poe...I explain in the lines following that one. The poem can be read as self descriptive as well as general. Perhaps it was at night when the house-tending, gardening, baking Emily Dickinson felt most in touch with her passions and 'Life'. The latent 'Earthquake' that she senses inside is too 'subtle' for most others to detect.Susan Kornfeldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05384011972647144453noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4029797379711350813.post-20558500858284289412015-12-06T10:57:41.226-08:002015-12-06T10:57:41.226-08:00what do you mean by
"The first two stanzas hi...what do you mean by<br />"The first two stanzas hint at the volatility and upheaval beneath the poet's surface."Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02409248881544498173noreply@blogger.com