Emily Dickinson
Poems by Emily Dickinson, Third Series
MABEL LOOMIS TODD It's all I have to bring to-day,
This, and my heart beside,
This, and my heart, and all the fields,
And all the meadows wide.
Be sure you count, should I forget,
Some one the sum could tell,
This, and my heart, and all the bees
Which in the clover dwell.
PREFACE
The intellectual activity of Emily Dickinson was so great that a large and characteristic choice is still possible among her literary material, and this third volume of her verses is put forth in response to the repeated wish of the admirers of her peculiar genius. Much of Emily Dickinson's prose was rhythmic, even rhymed, though frequently not set apart in lines.
Also many verses, written as such, were sent to friends in letters; these were published in 1894, in the volumes of her Letters. It has not been necessary, however, to include them in this Series, and all have been omitted, except three or four exceptionally strong ones, as "A Book," and "With Flowers."
There is internal evidence that many of the poems were simply spontaneous flashes of insight, apparently unrelated to outward circumstance. Others, however, had an obvious personal origin; for example, the verses "I had a Guinea golden," which seem to have been sent to some friend travelling in Europe, as a dainty reminder of letter-writing delinquencies. The surroundings in which any of Emily Dickinson's verses are known to have been written usually serve to explain them clearly; but in general the present volume is full of thoughts needing no interpretation to those who apprehend this scintillating spirit.
M. L. T.
AMHERST, October, 1896.
I. LIFE
POEMSI.
REAL RICHES
'T is little I could care for pearls
Who own the ample sea;
Or brooches, when the Emperor
With rubies pelteth me;
Or gold, who am the Prince of Mines;
Or diamonds, when I see
A diadem to fit a dome
Continual crowning me.
II.
SUPERIORITY TO FATE
Superiority to fate
Is difficult to learn.
'T is not conferred by any,
But possible to earn
A pittance at a time,
Until, to her surprise,
The soul with strict economy
Subsists till Paradise.
III.
HOPE
Hope is a subtle glutton;
He feeds upon the fair;
And yet, inspected closely,
What abstinence is there!
His is the halcyon table
That never seats but one,
And whatsoever is consumed
The same amounts remain.
IV.
FORBIDDEN FRUIT
IForbidden fruit a flavor has
That lawful orchards mocks;
How luscious lies the pea within
The pod that Duty locks!
V.
FORBIDDEN FRUIT
IIHeaven is what I cannot reach!
The apple on the tree,
Provided it do hopeless hang,
That 'heaven' is, to me.
The color on the cruising cloud,
The interdicted ground
Behind the hill, the house behind,
There Paradise is found!
VI.
A WORD
A word is dead
When it is said,
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That day.
VII
To venerate the simple days
Which lead the seasons by,
Needs but to remember
That from you or me
They may take the trifle
Termed mortality!
To invest existence with a stately air,
Needs but to remember
That the acorn there
Is the egg of forests
For the upper air!
VIII.
LIFE'S TRADES
It's such a little thing to weep,
So short a thing to sigh;
And yet by trades the size of these
We men and women die!
IX
Drowning is not so pitiful
As the attempt to rise.
Three times, 't is said, a sinking man
Comes up to face the skies,
And then declines forever
To that abhorred abode
Where hope and he part company,
For he is grasped of God.
The Maker's cordial visage,
However good to see,
Is shunned, we must admit it,
Like an adversity.
X
How still the bells in steeples stand,
Till, swollen with the sky,
They leap upon their silver feet
In frantic melody!
XI
If the foolish call them 'flowers,'
Need the wiser tell?
If the savans 'classify' them,
It is just as well!
Those who read the Revelations
Must not criticise
Those who read the same edition
With beclouded eyes!
Could we stand with that old Moses
Canaan denied,
Scan, like him, the stately landscape
On the other side,
Doubtless we should deem superfluous
Many sciences
Not pursued by learnèd angels
In scholastic skies!
Low amid that glad Belles lettres
Grant that we may stand,
Stars, amid profound Galaxies,
At that grand 'Right hand'!
XII.
A SYLLABLE
Could mortal lip divine
The undeveloped freight
Of a delivered syllable,
'T would crumble with the weight.
XIII.
PARTING
My life closed twice before its close;
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me,
So huge, so hopeless to conceive,
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
XIV.
ASPIRATION
We never know how high we are
Till we are called to rise;
And then, if we are true to plan,
Our statures touch the skies.
The heroism we recite
Would be a daily thing,
Did not ourselves the cubits warp
For fear to be a king.
XV.
THE INEVITABLE
While I was fearing it, it came,
But came with less of fear,
Because that fearing it so long
Had almost made it dear.
There is a fitting a dismay,
A fitting a despair.
'Tis harder knowing it is due,
Than knowing it is here.
The trying on the utmost,
The morning it is new,
Is terribler than wearing it
A whole existence through.