About Many Things

HOW many times these low feet staggered,
Only the soldered mouth can tell;
Try! can you stir the awful rivet?
Try! can you lift the hasps of steel?

Stroke the cool forehead, hot so often,
Lift, if you can, the listless hair;
Handle the adamantine fingers —
Never a thimble more shall wear.

Buzz the dull flies on the chamber window;
Brave shines the sun through the freckled pane;
Fearless, the cobweb swings from the ceiling —
Indolent housewife, in daisies lain!

First print Time and Eternity XI, 11
Johnson 187 | Franklin 238

■→IN POLISH

Text compared with the fascicle and prepared for publication by Teresa Pelka, available under any of the following licenses:
■Creative Commons License 4.0, BY-SA 3.0, and License 2.5.

■→Poems, first print by Higginson and Todd, page 120;
Syntagmatic comma, Brave shines the sun / Fearless, the cobweb swings.

■Notes for Emily Dickinson’s poetry;
Poems one-by-one print and fascicle comparison,
■Resource for Emily Dickinson’s poetry;
■Google Drive, manuscript fascicles.