Index, Love

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Notes for Emily Dickinson’s poetry | Fascicles and print; the poetic correlative with Webster 1828 and other literary devices, Latin and Greek inspiration, an Aristotelian theme, Things perpetual — these are not in time, but in eternity. More→

(1) I. Mine
Mine by the right of the white election!
Mine by the royal seal!
Mine by the sign in the scarlet prison
Bars cannot conceal! More→

(2) II. Bequest
You left me sweet, two legacies —
A legacy of love
A Heavenly Father would content,
Had He the offer of… More→

(3) III. Alter?
Alter? When the hills do.
Falter? When the sun
Question if his glory
Be the perfect one. More→

(4) IV. Suspense
Elysium is as far as to
The very nearest room,
If in that room a friend await
Felicity or doom. More→

(5) V. Surrender
Doubt me, my dim companion!
Why, God would be content
With but a fraction of the love
Poured thee without a stint.
The whole of me, forever,
What more the woman can —
Say quick, that I may dower thee
With last delight I own! More→

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(6) VI. If You Were Coming in the Fall
If you were coming in the fall,
I’d brush the summer by
With half a smile and half a spurn,
As housewives do a fly.

If I could see you in a year,
I’d wind the months in balls,
And put them each in separate drawers,
Until their time befalls.

If only centuries delayed,
I’d count them on my hand,
Subtracting till my fingers dropped
Into Van Diemen’s land. More→

(7) VII. With a Flower
I hide myself within my flower,
That wearing on your breast,
You, unsuspecting, wear me too —
And angels know the rest. More→

(8) VIII. Proof
That I did always love,
I bring thee proof:
That till I loved
I did not love enough. More→

(9) IX. Have You Got a Brook
Have you got a brook in your little heart,
Where bashful flowers blow,
And blushing birds go down to drink,
And shadows tremble so?

And nobody knows, so still it flows,
That any brook is there;
And yet your little draught of life
Is daily drunken there. More→

(10) X. Transplanted
As if some little Arctic flower,
Upon the polar hem,
Went wandering down the latitudes,
Until it puzzled came
To continents of summer… More→

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(11) XI. The Outlet
My river runs to thee:
Blue sea, wilt welcome me?
My river waits reply.
Oh, sea, look graciously! More→

(12) XII. In Vain
I cannot live with you,
It would be life,
And life is over there
Behind the shelf
The sexton keeps the key to,
Putting up
Our life — his
porcelain,
Like a cup
Discarded of the housewife,
Quaint or broken;
A newer Sevres pleases,
Old ones crack. More→

(13) XIII. Renunciation
There came a day at summer’s full
Entirely for me;
I thought that such were for the saints,
Where revelations be.

The sun, as common, went abroad,
The flowers, accustomed, blew,
As if no soul the solstice passed
That maketh all things new. More→

(14) XIV. Love’s Baptism
I’m ceded, I’ve stopped being theirs;
The name they dropped upon my face
With water, in the country church,
Is finished using now,
And they can put it with my dolls,
My childhood, and the string of spools
I’ve finished threading, too.

Baptized before without the choice,
But this time consciously, of grace
Unto supremest name,
Called to my full, the crescent dropped,
Existence’s whole arc filled up
With one small diadem. More→

(15) XV. Resurrection
It was a long parting, but the time
For interview had come;
Before the judgment-seat of God,
The last and second time
These fleshless lovers met,
A heaven in a gaze,
A heaven of heavens, the privilege
Of one another’s eyes. More→

(16) XVI. Apocalypse
I’m wife; I’ve finished that,
That other state;
I’m Czar, I’m woman now:
It’s safer so. More→

(17) XVII. The Wife
She rose to his requirement, dropped
The playthings of her life
To take the honorable work
Of woman and of wife. More→

(18) XVIII. Apotheosis
Come slowly, Eden!
Lips unused to thee;
Bashful, sip thy jasmines… More→

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