How sick—to wait—in any place—but thine—

How sick—to wait—in any place—but thine—
I knew last night—when someone tried to twine—
Thinking—perhaps—that I looked tired—or alone—
Or breaking—almost—with unspoken pain—

And I turned—ducal—
That right—was thine—
One port—suffices—for a Brig—like mine—

Ours be the tossing—wild though the sea—
Rather than a Mooring—unshared by thee.
Ours be the Cargo—unladen—here—
Rather than the "spicy isles—"
And thou—not there— 
                                               F410 (1862)  J368

This love poem builds on the previous work, "The Soul selects her own Society – ", and makes it personal. This time Dickinson writes in first person, recasting the unswervingly monogamous Soul as "a Brig" with only one port of call. The image is quite different than in the previous poem where the soul was a cold sort who closed the stony "Valves of her attention" to any but the chosen one. Dickinson focuses there on how the soul turns off attention (and love, presumably). In this poem we have the positive: love, passion, and yearning flow unimpeded towards the beloved.
          The central metaphor of the sea differs as much as possible from the powerful image of the stone. Whereas the stone is hard and unmoving, the sea is alive, mythic, passionate and wild. Dickinson has used the sea repeatedly as representing not only passion but the unknown and the dangerous. Harbor, as in F3, "On this wondrous sea – sailing silently," represents heaven where "no breakers roar — / Where the storm is o'er." 
          What Dickinson does in this poem and in F269, "Wild Nights — Wild Nights!", is to transfer the location of heavenly harbor to her beloved. In "Wild Nights," Dickinson claims the wild sea as "Eden" and the wild nights as "luxury" as long as she is moored in her lover. In this poem, she again would seek a life "tossing — wild" at sea rather than a loveless "Mooring" with someone else. In both cases it is the love and the lover that are the poet's desired port rather than a place of physical safety and repose.
          
The poem begins almost petulantly. The narrator is sick of waiting, tired of being anywhere but at her beloved's side — or at least his "place." She was annoyed with someone's attempt to cheer her up, "twine" their thoughts and feelings with hers. Perhaps this was a potential suitor or friend. If so, the valves of the narrator's attention were certainly closed against them. She "turned — ducal" on them, adopting that "divine Majority" (F409) that reserves the right to parcel out rights and privileges — and love.
          The second stanza establishes her moral stance: only the beloved has the right to twine with her soul. She is true blue, the sort of sailboat that wants but one port. Dickinson italicizes some words to be extra clear: she is monogamous. 

One can still sail to the spicy isles

        The lovely last stanza is a declaration to the beloved: Not only would I prefer a stormy life with you than a safe life without you, but I would rather have the "Cargo" of our love here and now than wait to arrive at some fantastical "spicy isles" only to find you are not there. The Spice Islands, of course, have drawn traders and explorers for centuries. Accessing them sparked Europe's Age of Exploration and launched a series of trade wars. The glamor of the remote islands where nutmeg, mace, cloves, and pepper grew on trees, not only attracted explorers and traders, but became a literary trope. When Dickinson uses the reference she is calling on their romantic mystery and allure. 
          She may also be referring to the person trying to twine with her. Is this person offering "the 'spicy isles'"? Might it be Sue whose attractions were spicy and unpredictable — and who might very well sit with the poet, notice her extreme loneliness, and practice her attractive arts on her?

The poem can be read as a journey of discovery itself. The poet begins by reflecting on the night before. Someone had offered love and she had rejected it. She reflects on what she learned, what she "knew": that "One port suffices — for a Brig — like mine." The poetics support the dawning recognition. A plethora of long vowels support the plaintive, longing quality of the first stanza. A family of rhymes knits it together: thine, twine, alone, pain. The narrator seems lost. The tired and almost whiney tone, however, turns abrupt in the short second stanza with such curt-sounding words as ducal, right, port, and Brig. Her feelings are suddenly quite clear to her. The third stanza pivots to the impassioned with trochaic/anapestic lines. Two begin "Ours be..." and the formulation is emphatic: Ours be this, rather than that; our love is passionate and real rather than tame and romantic.

Somehow I feel sorry for whoever was with her that evening. Perhaps it was the always alluring and never reliable original Spice Girl, Sue, Dickinson's sister-in-law, neighbor, and former soul mate if not lover.
 
           

The Soul selects her own Society —

The Soul selects her own Society —
Then — shuts the Door —
To her divine Majority —
Present no more —

Unmoved — she notes the Chariots — pausing —
At her low Gate —
Unmoved — an Emperor be kneeling
Upon her Mat —

I've known her — from an ample nation—
Choose One—
Then — close the Valves of her attention—
Like Stone —
                                                              F409 (1862)  J303


Some folks are extremely discriminating. I've known a few. But I've never known anyone quite as discriminating as the generalized Soul of this poem, one of Dickinson's most anthologized. 
          Dickinson conceives the soul as a stately and majestic entity. Her "Majority" is herself and what few other souls she chooses for her society; what's more, it is a "divine" majority. There is no temptation to admit others, no matter who they may be — even emperors kneeling at the door begging for entrance. Nope. She "notes" them and is completely "Unmoved" by their interest. 
          In the last stanza, Dickinson refers to a soul in the particular, as if there is a universal soul that somehow acts individually within each of us. At times, she says, this soul might just choose one friend. That's pretty discriminating, although it's clear that the poet is not talking about one's public face or persona. It's easy enough to chat and hang out with casual acquaintances but still keep them at arm's length from the depths of your soul. That place is sacrosanct.

Victorian water valve

        The last image is intriguing and delivers one of Dickinson's word wallops. She presents the attention that we give to others, significant others that is – friends, associates, neighbors, extended family – as if it were flowing water. Once this ultra discriminating Soul has chosen her friend from an "ample nation," she turns off the faucet, closes the "Valves of her attention." The flow of friendship and love has been turned off to all but one. Not a drop is left over. The soul has shut her valves categorically: "Like Stone." The word drops out of the otherwise abstract poem like a rock. It is heavy, solid, immune to entreaties or tears, implacable.
        
One must wonder if Dickinson is reflecting on her own soul. After all, it was about this time that she was withdrawing from society and staying home. Within a few years she would not venture out of her property at all. It was about this time that she would send down her regrets to even her most beloved friends who came to call. One must also wonder if she is reflecting on a beloved other who has shut her out.
         I think, though, that she is meditating on the sovereignty of the soul. We sometimes talk about soul mates, or love at first sight, or having chemistry with some one. This may be the Soul making her choices. That is all well and good. But Dickinson writes with the outsider's knowledge of what it means to not be the soul mate. It is as if the valve of communion turned to stone.
        

Like Some Old fashioned Miracle

Like Some Old fashioned Miracle 
When Summertime is done — 
Seems Summer's Recollection 
And the Affairs of June 

As infinite Tradition 
As Cinderella's Bays — 
Or Little John — of Lincoln Green — 
Or Blue Beard's Galleries — 

Her Bees have a fictitious Hum — 
Her Blossoms, like a Dream — 
Elate us — till we almost weep — 
So plausible — they seem — 

Her Memories like Strains — Review — 
When Orchestra is dumb — 
The Violin in Baize replaced — 
And Ear — and Heaven — numb —
                                                                       F408 (1862) J302

Oh, summers past. They are like some age of Fantasy or pages out of children's books and fairy tales. How the golden bees hummed around the flowers; how the woods and gardens bloomed...improbable fiction! It makes us "almost weep," the memories are so real. We can practically re-live it all, the way music echoes in our heads long after the orchestra is through.
          You could definitely sing this poem to the tune of "Amazing Grace," for like that hymn, the poem is written in common ballad form. It has the slow, sleepy air of Amazing Grace, too. The first stanza lulls us with the sibilance; "the Affairs of June" reminds us of our own affairs in that fine month.
          The second stanza hearkens back to the stories we loved as children: Cinderella, Robin Hood, Treasure Island. We were all heroes in those stories. No one was cynical. And summer is like that, Dickinson suggests, with its rhythm of possibility. Life is growing so improbably beautiful all around us that we feel as we felt when reading about Cinderella's triumphal entry at the ball.
          The last stanza avoids sticky sentimentality. Dickinson could have ended with the nostalgic tone she employs throughout and produced a very fine poem of that type. Instead, she roughs the poem with discordant words and ideas. "Memories like Strains" makes sense when thinking about it: the memories play like melodies. But the eye registers "Strains" as perhaps "Stains" – not a pretty image, and one that suggests summer wasn't all roses. "Strains" also suggest effort. The whole phrase, "Memories like Strains — Review," is awkward and even a bit jarring. The meter doesn't flow smoothly, as it does in the other stanzas, and there are words missing that disrupt the grammar and syntax. Something is a bit off – could it be summer itself? Or is it the lack of summer.
          The second line of the final stanza has the orchestra as "dumb" rather than "silent" or "still" – words that would return to the sibilance of the first stanza and that would be more literally accurate. "Dumb" implies speechless, as in "struck dumb," or else unable to speak because of physical problems. Dickinson means for us to stop at that word. There is a consciousness involved in the comings and goings of summer – and youth.
          The glorious violin, voice of the individual and of beauty, is put back in its wrapping, silenced now with no one to play it. Someone has put the violin away, while someone else strains to hear remembered melodies until The "Ear," standing for the listening individual, becomes "numb." The numbness here sounds less like nostalgia than grief. Even Heaven seems to have been affected. It too is numb.
          I think Dickinson is not only writing a love letter to summer, but commenting on innocence. Our childhood seems golden and mythical. We think of those times again and again, for they are long gone. Once alive with wonder and potential, we gradually numb ourselves. Heaven, too, loses its celestial draw. And that is the loss of summer's innocence.
          Now one could point out that "numb" and "dumb" make a convenient rhyming pair. But I don't think Dickinson selected them because they sort of fit but more importantly rhymed. No, the words may have occured to her because of that, but she liked the pair for other reasons, too. She is in the autumn mood — and that is appropriate for autumn does, after all, follow summer.

One need not be a Chamber—to be Haunted—

One need not be a Chamber — to be Haunted —
One need not be a House —
The Brain has Corridors — surpassing
Material Place —

Far safer, of a Midnight Meeting
External Ghost
Than its interior Confronting —
That Cooler Host.

Far safer, through an Abbey gallop,
The Stones a'chase —
Than Unarmed, one's a'self encounter —
In lonesome Place —

Ourself behind ourself, concealed —
Should startle most —
Assassin hid in our Apartment
Be Horror's least.

The Body — borrows a Revolver —
He bolts the Door —
O'erlooking a superior spectre —
Or More —
                                                                        J670,  F407 (1862) 670

 There's a real horror in the idea that the most terrifying ghosts and horrors reside within our own brains. Dickinson has plumbed this terror in two of her earlier Gothic poems,

F360 "The Soul has Bandaged moments—" and F341  "'Tis so appalling—it exhilarates—." In the first, the soul is paralyzed with fear by "ghastly" ghostly figures, and by "the Horror" to which she is returned, shackled and bound, whenever she tries to escape her imprisonment. The second poem takes us beyond horror, to a place of knowledge where there is no hope and where Fright and Terror are free to celebrate their "Gay, Ghastly, Holiday!"
          Dickinson states her argument in the first lines: the brain can be as haunted as any old, abandoned house; what's more, it is infinitely larger. That's a frightening thought—and it rings true, for we can indeed wander indefinitely through the mazes and corners of our minds. This can lead to madness or paralysis--or perhaps even enlightenment. Although here Dickinson writes from the madness and paralysis camp, it is by braving the demons of her mind that she receives her enlightenment. 
          Dickinson never holds back. We saw in F401, "Dare you see a Soul at the 'White Heat,'" how she dares the reader to "crouch within the door" as her soul is hammered and forged until at a white heat. This poem returns from the forge imagery to the frightening horrors within. 
          That inner ghost is cold, a "Cooler Host" than even an "External Ghost." It is extremely dangerous, worse than an "Assassin" lurking behind the door. It's the last thing you'd want to encounter, especially in the "lonesome Place" that is the deep interior of the brain.

The haunted Whitby Abbey

          What's interesting here is the multiplicity of self that is implied. There is the brain, first, that has the corridors and is haunted. Then there are the multiple selves, strangers and deadly dangerous to each other, that inhabit the brain. It is "Ourself behind ourself" that should scare us the most. We would be better off to be chased through a haunted Abbey than for the outward self to encounter the hidden one in our own interior. Then there is the body, that hapless bit of flesh that in obvious futility "borrows a Revolver" and "bolts the Door."
          Most frightening of all is the  rhyming spondee at the end of the poem: "Or More—". The "r" sounds add a dark, ominous quality. It causes us to fear for that poor Body and its useless revolver. The "spectre" he is defending himself against is not only "superior" but clearly not alone. There are very probably "More."
          While it may be that Dickinson wrote this for the goose-bump thrill of the Gothic writing she enjoyed (such as Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights), I find it likely that she really did find her mind haunted. But while many of us ignore or can easily divert and suppress our inner demons, and while some poor few of us fall victim to them, Dickinson never gave up her inner explorations. Her poetry is often a traveler's report of her terrifying adventures. 
          

Over and over, like a Tune—

Over and over, like a Tune— 
The Recollection plays— 
Drums off the Phantom Battlements 
Cornets of Paradise— 

Snatches, from Baptized Generations— 
Cadences too grand 
But for the Justified Processions 
At the Lord's Right hand.
                                                             F406 (1862) J367


Written in common ballad or hymn form, this poem returns to the theme of ethereal music that Dickinson hears. This time she keeps returning to something "like a Tune" that she has heard and that now plays over and over in her mind. It is "too grand" for anything earthly, so in the second stanza she attributes it to those souls who reside in heaven, the "Baptized Generations", who comprise the heavenly processions. They are "Justified" by their faith (Romans 5:1) and are able to stand at the right-hand side of God.
        Perhaps because Dickinson is writing this poem during the Civil War, she hears their "Cadences" as military music. There are drums from the battlements and cornets rousing the troops. She only hears "Snatches" and "Cadences" from this music, but it is enough to convince her that it is "too grand" for any source but a heavenly host. Perhaps the martial heavenly music is meant to mirror the fight of Good against Evil that many New Englanders saw being played out on the battlefields of the Civil War.

Album cover: The Heavenly Music Corporation
(Robert Fripp and Brian Eno)

          In F334, "Of all the Sounds despatched abroad," Dickinson writes of "That Phraseless Melody" played by an orchestra of wind and bird and forest. The music is more "inner than the bone" and has even the power to raise the dust of the dead and make them dance. 
          She makes a more explicit reference to the singing of the saints in f229, "Musicians wrestle everywhere," where she describes a glorious music that she hears throughout the day and when she wakes up in the night. It isn't bird or band or hymn. Instead, the poet speculates, it is either the saints or the music of the spheres.
          It will be interesting as I make my way through her poems (only 1350+ more to go!) to see other poems about the transporting music Dickinson hears.

Although I put away his life—

Although I put away his life—
An Ornament too grand
For Forehead low as mine, to wear,
This might have been the Hand

That sowed the flower, he preferred—
Or smoothed a homely pain,
Or pushed the pebble from his path—
Or played his chosen tune—

On Lute the least—the latest—
But just his Ear could know
That whatsoe'er delighted it,
I never would let go—

The foot to bear his errand—
A little Boot I know—
Would leap abroad like Antelope—
With just the grant to do—

His weariest Commandment—
A sweeter to obey,
Than "Hide and Seek"—
Or skip to Flutes—
Or all Day, chase the Bee—

Your Servant, Sir, will weary—
The Surgeon, will not come—
The World, will have its own—to do—
The Dust, will vex your Fame—

The Cold will force your tightest door
Some February Day,
But say my apron bring the sticks
To make your Cottage gay—

That I may take that promise
To Paradise, with me—
To teach the Angels, avarice,
You, Sir, taught first—to me. 
                                                                        F405 (1862)  J366 

Dickinson indulges herself in a bit of house-wifely fantasy. The daydream goes like this: I turned away from a possible marriage with a great man because I was too lowly. But imagine, my poor little hand could have been planting his favorite flowers or removing pebbles from his path, and playing the lute for him. I'd do his errands and his bidding. It would be better than playing games or chasing bees or dancing. 
          The games and skipping to music are childish images. The poet isn't writing as a mature woman but as a young romantic girl. 

The 1950s were a great time for
the romance of the housewife.

          The fantasy turns a bit morbid towards the end. The master's servant will eventually become old and tired. As "Sir" gets old and infirm himself, the doctor rarely comes by to see him. The world moves on to other people and issues, while fame and reputation begin to pass him by. One day "The Cold will force [his] tightest door" and he will die. But if Sir will promise that the speaker can at least and at last serve him by bringing flowering branches to decorate his grave, his "Cottage," she could die happily. She would be so hungry to serve him even in this way that the angels would learn "avarice." While today we think of "avarice" as meaning insatiable greed, in Dickinson's time the word had some positive connotations. In this context it probably means the desire to keep something valuable to herself and be vigilant over it in a watchful and protective way.
          I don't think this poem tops anybody's list of Dickinson's best work. It would be a very nice poem if it were actually written by some young and love-struck girl rather than from a world-class poet. However, lurking in the poem's saccharine sentiment may be a grand dose of irony. Perhaps Dickinson wrote this as the same sort of parody that infuses F125, "A poor--torn heart--a tattered heart." In that poem Dickinson pens a send-up of Charles Dickens' Little Nell. Here she may be mocking the love-sick maiden.

To put this World down, like a Bundle—

To put this World down, like a Bundle—
And walk steady, away,
Requires Energy—possibly Agony—
'Tis the Scarlet way

Trodden with straight renunciation
By the Son of God—
Later, his faint Confederates
Justify the Road—

Flavors of that old Crucifixion—
Filaments of Bloom, Pontius Pilate sowed—
Strong Clusters, from Barabbas' Tomb—

Sacrament, Saints partook before us—
Patent, every drop,
With the Brand of the Gentile Drinker
Who indorsed the Cup— 
                                                                              F404 (1862)  J527


Dickinson writes here of renunciation and the suffering that follows when one utterly rejects the world.  

          She begins by picturing life in this world—family, profession, woods, conventional religion, and beaches—as a "Bundle" that one might put down and walk away from. To do so, however, requires a huge effort, "possibly Agony," and even bloodshed, for this is "the Scarlet way." The world doesn't understand or treat with much charity those who reject it.
          The second stanza makes this point more clearly. Jesus renounced the world when he rejected fame and fortune and the wisdom of the elders. His bloody death did indeed put him on the scarlet way. His disciples, those "faint Confederates", wrote about their experiences in pieces that became books of the New Testament. This was also their attempt to "Justify the Road".

          Changing the metaphor, Dickinson considers Jesus' death sentence by Pontius Pilate as a sowing of bloody flowers. They retain the "flavors" of the crucifixion as they are "Filaments" of that early flower. Like the "faint Confederates," the later saints are but flavors and filaments of the real thing. The poet has these filaments originating from the tomb of Barabbas, the thief Pilate released in stead of Jesus because the crowd (according to the disciples who wrote the accounts) demanded Jesus be killed. Consequently "Strong Clusters" of flowers emanate from Barabbas' Tomb, for he was the one intended to be buried.

The communion cup

          The last stanza is difficult, primarily because of the "Gentile Drinker". It sounds as if the Drinker should be Jesus, both because it is the essence of his blood that infuses the sacrament, and because it was Jesus who instructed his disciples to eat bread and drink wine in his memory.  "This is my blood," he reportedly said. However, neither Jesus nor any of his apostles were gentiles.
        Paul was the apostle to the gentiles, though, and "Gentile Drinker" might have a double meaning here. His ministry changed Christianity from a jewish religion to a gentile one as he metaphorically drank them in. Or Dickinson might be conflating Paul with his gentile ministry for poetic purposes. That Paul also put his brand, or stamp, on all aspects of Christianity is beyond doubt.
        If Paul is the Drinker whose teachings are "patent" in the communion cup, then the stanza becomes ironic. It introduces an interpreter into the communion sacrament and that introduces an element of doubt. Have the "Flavors" of the crucifixion been altered somehow by the stamp of Paul? Have christians been unwittingly following Paul rather than Jesus in some subtle but profound way that is bound up in the sacrament of communion?

I don't think Dickinson is distancing herself from the "Scarlet way", though. Her admiration of Jesus' "straight renunciation" seems real. If anything, she is making a veiled warning about letting a sacrament take the place of deeply felt personal renunciation, about accepting something with someone else's brand on it for the real thing.

I reason, Earth is short—

I reason, Earth is short— 
And Anguish—absolute— 
And many hurt, 
But, what of that? 

 I reason, we could die— 
The best Vitality 
Cannot excel Decay, 
But, what of that? 

I reason, that in Heaven— 
Somehow, it will be even— 
Some new Equation, given— 
But, what of that?
                                                              F403 (1862) J301 


As Emily Dickinson wandered through her garden, baked the family's bread, and penned her incredible poems, the Civil War increased its carnage. In April 1862, twenty-four thousand men were killed during the battle of Shiloh: 13,000 of 63,000 Union soldiers and 11,000 of 40,000 Confederate troops. There were many other battles that year and thousands of other deaths. Oddly, Emily Dickinson never wrote about the war or slavery, although New England boys were dying daily. New England as a whole was passionately opposed to slavery. The war wasn't going well for the Union, despite Lincoln's best efforts. The war would have been the major topic of discussion in any town and state east of the Mississippi (and west, too, though probably to a lesser degree). 

Battle of Shiloh: Could Dickinson really have ignored this?

         Could Dickinson tune out this cataclysm as she worried about her relationships with Sue, Samuel Bowles, her father, and other figures of interest? Or did the war have a profound effect on her that although not explicitly addressed seeps out in her metaphors, her sense of cosmic justice, her perceptions of human nature? I'm pretty sure that although she retreated from the world she was aware of what was going on. If she chose the garden and the writing desk as quiet refuges from the unfathomable violence around her, it would be a sane thing to do. Walt Whitman, her contemporary, chose the opposite path, throwing himself into the war effort and then into helping at veterans' hospitals. 
          It seems to me that Dickinson instead retreated inward, questioning, always questioning the nature and extent of suffering and death. In this poem she adopts "reason" to say that a person's life is short, full of anguish, and traveling from vitality to decay. This is all more observation than reason, but she is building up to the bitter, even sarcastic, conclusion. Somehow "in Heaven / ... it will be even— / Some new Equation, given," but so what? So what if God gives us a lovely afterlife that rights the wrongs of life, that gives more, say, to those who had less, or some such scheme? That's too little and much too late.

The poem is written the the short and direct iambic trimeter. The first stanza establishes the breezy tone that scoffs at anguish with a wave of ennui. It uses the "t" alliterations, adding a bit of bite: short / absolute / hurt / that. The two "a" words in the second line slow the reader down from this breezy clip—you have to slow down to read "Anguish—absolute." She wants us to focus on that thought. We absolutely are going to suffer in this short life. And then she lobs the ironic afterthought that she repeats in each of the three stanzas: "But, what of that?"
          The second stanza begins and ends the same way, with "I reason" and "But, what of that?" This time she claims that no matter how healthy you are or full of vitality, you are going to decay and rot away soon enough. Thank goodness for cremation, eh? This stanza has assonance, using open vowels such as in reason, die, Vitality, and Decay.
          It is tempting to read the last stanza as proud. If this is what you give us during our earthly life, I imagine her saying to a Creator, then I'm not going to be all grateful and dewy over your Heavenly paradise. When Dickinson writes that the equation will be "even"—that the wonders of heaven will be more than sufficient to compensate for the Anguish of earth—I don't think she believes it.

We've seen this bitter sarcasm before in   F215 :
       

I shall know why – when Time is over – 


And I have ceased to wonder why – 


Christ will explain each separate anguish


In the fair schoolroom of the sky – 



He will tell me what "Peter" promised – 


And I – for wonder at his woe –

I shall forget the drop of Anguish


That scalds me now – that scalds me now!

                                                        

Dickinson may be referring to some private grief, but I cannot believe that the horrors of the Civil War were far beneath the surface.

To hear an Oriole sing

To hear an Oriole sing
May be a common thing—
Or only a divine.

It is not of the Bird
Who sings the same, unheard,
As unto Crowd—

The Fashion of the Ear
Attireth that it hear
In Dun, or fair—

So whether it be Rune,
Or whether it be none
Is of within.

The "Tune is in the Tree—"
The Skeptic—showeth me—
"No Sir! In Thee!" 
                                                               F402 (1862)  J526

This is one of Dickinson's wisdom poems. While it is commonly said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, the poet applies the same idea to bird song. The Oriole sings the same song whether or not anyone is listening. Those who do hear, however, make their own determination whether or not the song is plain or lovely. The sense of beauty lies within.

Baltimore Oriole: Photo, Joby Joseph

          I like the way she frames the alternatives in the first stanza. To hear the Oriole sing is either a "common thing" or "only a divine." Note the "only." Dickinson is being playfully ironic. Wouldn't we all rather have a divine experience rather than a common one? Well, maybe not, but certainly regarding bird song we'd rather hear the beautiful song of an oriole rather than the thin threads of chipping sparrow.
         It is the ear that determines whether the song is common or divine, "Rune" or "none." The awareness comes from within. Something like this is meant in some of Biblical teachings: don't cast your pearls before swine; "He who has ears, let him hear." Song and melody can be explained in terms of sound waves and vibrations, nerve endings and brain process. The sense of beauty and mystery come from something deeper within the human experience.
         It may well be that Dickinson has poetry in mind as well as bird song. Poems might not have an intrinsic meaning; outside human experience they might be completely meaningless. Critics of her day might look at the elements of poetry: meter, rhyme, etc.; but that is like analyzing bird song. It is a satisfying exercise for the common but misses the divine entirely.

Dare you see a Soul at the "White Heat"?

Dare you see a Soul at the "White Heat"?
Then crouch within the door—
Red—is the Fire’s common tint—
But when the vivid Ore

Has vanquished Flame’s conditions—
It quivers from the Forge
Without a color, but the Light
Of unannointed Blaze—

Least Village, boasts its Blacksmith—
Whose Anvil’s even ring
Stands symbol for the finer Forge
That soundless tugs—within—

Refining these impatient Ores
With Hammers, and with Blaze
Until the designated Light
Repudiate the Forge—
                                                               F401 (1862)  J365

In one of her most studied and anthologized works, Dickinson dares the reader to confront a soul being battered by God. She begins with the dare: are you brave enough to see a white-hot soul? Her metaphor is that of the blacksmith, the ore, and the forge. The dare is to “crouch within the door” to the blacksmith’s shop. Forging the raw metal into a usable tool is a violent process. How many of us are willing to face the forge of our own souls? It hasn’t always been smooth sailing. Life is rarely gentle—particularly to our poets and visionaries.

Blacksmith with soul? Or poet with poem.

          The first two stanzas outline the process in all its drama. The third explicitly outlines the metaphor. The fourth, in classic Dickinson style, turns our understanding of the poem on its head. The poet begins by setting the reader down at the smithy’s door. She is the guide. She points to the red flame of the forge hearth: it’s “Fire’s common tint.” The metal will also turn red after being placed into the forge. But once the bellows are applied or the metal left within the flame long enough, the fire heats the metal until “the vivid Ore” has no more impurities to burn off; its volatile gases have burned off, and it is left “Without a color.” The blacksmith removes the metal and it “quivers” in its white heat, ready to be hammered and shaped.
          Yet “Unannointed Blaze” would indicate that the metal has not yet been annealed—a cooling process that strengthens the metal yet gives it a bit of give so that it will not break when struck. Dickinson could have used the more precise term “unannealed,” but there is a wonderful resonance with “Unannointed” that not only suggests the brittle state of the metal but the vulnerable state of the soul. It must go through further trials before it can withstand more blows.
Dickinson makes sure her metaphor is clearly understood. The forge and its anvil represent the severe difficulties we must deal with in life, but unlike the noise made as the blacksmith hammers his hot iron, our internal forge is “finer” and “tugs” silently at us from within.
          The ore is worked and refined through hammering, shaping, and re-heating until the blacksmith is satisfied. Certain tools need heating to red-yellow. Others perform best if heated until blue. The blacksmith must decide.  This is what the poet means by “designated Light.”
          But then the twist: at some point the ore is going to stop the process. The blazing heat, the hammering and shaping—enough is enough. The Ore, having reached the appropriate light, “Repudiate[s] the Forge.”
          Let’s put some flesh on that metaphor. The blacksmith is the agent throughout the poem. He selects the ore, subjects it to heat, and then hammers it on his anvil. He will also anneal and temper the metal. He creates something new, or re-formed something old: a knife, for example, out of raw ore or scrap metal. The metal must submit: it’s only metal! Until—and that’s the Dickinsonian part—the Soul in its white heat finally draws the line and repudiates the forge.
          If the blacksmith is God and Ore is the soul, we see that God fits us for some purpose through quite brutal means—“With Hammers, and with Blaze.” We think of the suffering of the saints and how they emerged purified and holy. We are certainly not meant to think of the poor souls who are beaten down by the trials of life until they are dispirited, meek things. But the last two lines imply that at some point the ore speaks back to the blacksmith. It rejects and refuses the hammer and heat. Perhaps this is a type of rebellion or perhaps it is the Blacksmith God’s goal to have a creation with an independent and fully formed sense of rightness and judgment.
The poem, for all its simple metaphor, is very abstract. Still, I take it as a very personal poem. Dickinson, I think, is writing about her own soul here. Her torment “soundless tugs” within her, yet she perceives her Blacksmith as no less violent than the local smith. She has been heated, hit with repeated shaping blows, heated again… etc. At some point she will repudiate him.
          Some scholars consider the metaphor to reflect the poetic process. It's not easy writing poems, and Dickinson dares the reader to peek in at the white-hot heat that forges them. She would be the blacksmith in this case. She writes and re-writes and tinkers with them, stopping only when the poem has enough life in it to let her know it's done. 

I think the Hemlock likes to stand

I think the Hemlock likes to stand
Upon a Marge of Snow—
It suits his own Austerity—
And satisfies an awe

That men, must slake in Wilderness—
And in the Desert—cloy—
An instinct for the Hoar, the Bald—
Lapland's—necessity—

The Hemlock's nature thrives—on cold—
The Gnash of Northern winds
Is sweetest nutriment—to him—
His best Norwegian Wines —

To satin Races—he is nought—
But Children on the Don,
Beneath his Tabernacles, play,
And Dnieper Wrestlers, run.
                                                                F400 (1862)  525


Numerous anthropology and geography papers have been written on the difference between the residents of northern and southern climes. Dickinson dives in here and makes it clear her own preference is for the cold north, here symbolized by the Hemlock.
          She anthropomorphizes the Hemlock as if it represents a character type (perhaps her austere and cold father?): he "likes" to be in the snow because it "suits his own Austerity." Something about this majestic tree braving the winter from its "Marge of Snow" touches us, the poet claims. The graceful tree amid a cold, wind-swept landscape awakens "an awe" that only wilderness satisfies. 

Photo of hemlocks: Michaela,
The Gardeners Eden

          This sense of awe turns cloying in the desert and warmer climate where the "satin Races" live. I read "satin" to mean all those folks who live a life of ease. Dickinson suggests that humans have some instinctive predilection for the wintry "Bald" barrens where the hemlock survives. This is "Lapland's—necessity."
          Lapland is usually considered to be the northernmost part of Scandinavia. In Dickinson's day, however, "Lapland" might refer to mystical lands where sorcerers conjured icy weather; it might also suggest purity and simplicity. In fact, New England itself was sometimes referred to as Lapland. 
          Dickinson paints a heroic picture of the hemlock: austere, awesome, thriving in the cold--he even relishes those Nor'easters as if they were the finest wine. Alas, she gets a few details wrong: the hemlock isn't found in Lapland, would never enjoy "Norwegian Wines." She is no doubt thinking of the Eastern or Canadian hemlock (Tsuga canadensis) that would be a fairly common sight in Massachusetts.
          It would not be found along the great Russian rivers, Don and Dnieper, where Dickinson imagines children play "Beneath his Tabernacles" and wrestlers work out. The Don River begins south of Moscow, flowing through the central Russian uplands until emptying in the Sea of Azov and thence to the Black Sea. The Dnieper River, originating to the east of Moscow, flows through Belarus and Ukraine to empty directly into the Black Sea.

Edward Dickinson: perhaps a bit
bald and hoar; certainly austere

          But it would be churlish to quibble about such details when we have such a fine tribute to this excellent tree. I'm going to put myself out on one of its limbs and venture that Dickinson is indeed thinking of her father. People who are soft and pampered might not appreciate his stern, orthodox Calvinism, but his strength and shade were surely a sufficient tabernacle under which the children of the household might play. I can even read a playful little dig at her father when she writes about the "Hoar, the Bald." If Andrew Jackson was "Old Hickory," then is it such a stretch that Edward Dickinson was "Old Hemlock?" 
          After he died, though, she wrote to her mentor T.W. Higginson, "His heart was pure and terrible and I think no other like it exists." Perhaps she caught a glimpse of this in the hemlock trees standing in the snow.