Emily Dickinson Museum Discussion Group, 15 January 2016

Emily Dickinson Museum Poetry Discussion Group

Facilitated by Tom Martinson

"Nature - the Gentlest Mother is."

Tom. In terms of the topic, I wasn’t sure about it. I started off with the poem A Bird came down the Walk. I was fascinated by the last lines.

Than oars divide the ocean,

Too silver for a seam -

Or butterflies, off Banks of Noon

Leap, plashless - as they swim.

I started thinking about her depiction of nature as something very delicate, and something to be admired from afar. So I started reading other poems, to see if I could find other poems that connected with that. Then I started seeing that sometimes nature is very delicate, but sometimes it’s also something scary and powerful. So that’s how I got to Emily Dickinson as an observer of nature. We all know that she was, but I think that she brings a perspective that a lot of people who may or may not be environmentally conscious could appreciate. That’s how I came to the topic, but if we get off on different directions, that’s fine, too. Could I ask someone to read 654?

Clare reads.

Beauty—be not caused—It Is—

Chase it, and it ceases—

Chase it not, and it abides—

Overtake the Creases

In the Meadow—when the Wind

Runs his fingers thro' it—

Deity will see to it

That You never do it—
                        - J516/Fr654/M310

[ To hear this poem read aloud go to https://youtu.be/207g_DVPfKA ]

Tom. I’m OK with that poem, until the last two lines. There seems to be some divine intervention here – anyone want to try to straighten me out on this? What is the antecedent of “it?”

Harrison The ceases.

Greg. You never overtake the creases.

Tom. What does that mean, overtake the creases?

Greg. In the nineteenth-century science was beginning to de-mystify what had been miraculous unknowable phenomena, and she uses the word overtake – and science was overtaking the mysteries of nature – but you can’t really do that with the wind in the grass.

Tom. Yes, so I wonder if she’s saying that the Deity does not want us to interfere or the Deity does not want us to get ahead of nature.

Greg. I read Deity as not so much as the Calvinist father God but more as just the divine in nature.

Harrison. “Overtaken” is an interesting word. She has a poem that begins:

The overtakelessness of those
Who have accomplished Death 
Majestic is to me beyond
The majesties of Earth –
She’s talking about distance between us and those who have accomplished  death and those who have died. To overtake them would be to establish some kind of communication with them. … but you see, overtaking the creases involves not only reaching them physically, but understanding them in a certain way.

Tom. And the admonishment here is that we don’t want that understaning?

Harrison. The Deity doesn’t want it. The Deity could be nature herself.

Tom. Right
.
Elaine. I’m just thinking,   Beauty—be not caused—It Is—It is, and then, to take it another step, you’re not going to change the crease, because they are, and I don’t see Deity as imposing anything. I see her as saying “It is what it is.” That’s about as deep as I can go.

Someone. That’s beautiful.

Robert. I was seeing it as art is – beauty is viewed from a natural distance. If you get close to the creases you’re not going to appreciate – it’s like you’re looking at a picture from a distance.

Jay. Are we sure that this is a poem about nature? It could be a poem about beauty of all sorts, and she just uses two lines, really, to illustrate the point. Whenever you chase beauty you may destroy it. So many of her poems start out as though they area about nature, but they may be about something in addition or instead of.

Lucy. I think you’re right in some capacity, because she’s talking about the difference between natural beauty and performed beauty, or beauty that’s made, or chased. In this poem I think we see her dubbing her favorite kind of beauty as the untouched beauty, and it’s that that you find when you walk outside

Greg. In another poem she writes,

A Color stands abroad

On Solitary Fields

That Science cannot overtake

But Human Nature feels.

I think that’s the same sentiment. [That’s A Light exists in spring].

Elaine. Is there a date?

Greg. 1863 according to Franklin.

Tom. One of the things that I thought of when I read this poem was Keats’ Grecian Urn. There’s a picture on the urn of lovers pursuing each other, forever frozen in time, never actually to acquire the treasure. You’re almost within reach, but you’re never actually there. The other line I thought of was “A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”

Melba. Robert, I was interested in what you were saying, and the act of perception, because the Transcendentalist writers were very aware of the act of perception as simultaneously an act of creation going on, an arrangement in you mind, and I think Emerson is really close to associating that with the divine, the divine impulse. So, if Emily’s thoughts are running along that route, then Deity will see to it is kind of her comment that the divine aspect of arranging and seeing this scene it that you will always have to be at a distance to the crease. You can’t actually get to it and touch it. You have to be far enough away from it that you can put it in perspective.

Harrison. It reminds me of a mirage, when you’re driving along the highway in the summer, and you see puddles ahead of you. When you get there, they’re not there.

Jule. I wonder if, metaphorically, overtake the creases could be if you imagine yourself out in nature, the wind is blowing the grass, and if you overtake them, if you try to run by them, the all of a sudden they’re behind you, you’re not looking at the beauty anymore.

Tom. “Overtaken” in the sense that a runner has overtaken an opponent in a race. That’s an interesting thought. OK, next we will go to 171.

Elaine reads.

A fuzzy fellow, without feet,

Yet doth exceeding run!

Of velvet, is his Countenance,

And his Complexion, dun!

Sometime, he dwelleth in the grass!

Sometime, upon a bough,

From which he doth descend in plush

Upon the Passer-by!

All this in summer.

But when winds alarm the Forest Folk,

He taketh Damask Residence—

And struts in sewing silk!

Then, finer than a Lady,

Emerges in the spring!

A Feather on each shoulder!

You'd scarce recognize him!

By Men, yclept Caterpillar!

By me! But who am I,

To tell the pretty secret

Of the Butterfly!
                        -J173/Fr171/M98

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/7y9vaG4I0QI ]

I  think she’s used all of her exclamation points in this poem [laughter].

Yclep by the way, is middle English for “named.”

Greg. I wonder why she put that in.

Harrison. It would have had better meter had she said “by men named caterpillar” instead. It would have scanned better. [20.31]

Elaine. And then she demurred. By me! But who am I …

Clare. Don’t you think she had fun writing this? I can just see her smiling. It has a little joi de vivre. [general agreement]

Harrison. What does damask mean?

Several. A kind of cloth. Elegant cloth. Usually a silk.

Harrison. I had a kindergarten teacher who had a caterpillar costume [laughter]. He’d get inside of it, and emerge, and spread his wings on the outside. I’ve never forgotten that. It’s been a while.

Tom. So, I thought that this one paired well with the previous one. Because it’s another one of those where, “I can see it, and I can enjoy it, and I can be enriched by it, but it’s far deeper than I can completely comprehend.

Jay. It’s a little earlier than the other one. It may actually be about nature [laughter].

Tom. Well, I’m hoping all of these have something to do with nature. That was my intention.

Lucy. I like all the vocabulary of textures, fuzzy – velvet – plush, and then finer than a Lady, Emerges in the spring!. I thought the gender stuff in this was really interesting, with regard to this idea of beauty – it’s really this kind of flashy gentleman caterpillar that is very decked out, and he’s definitely finer than a lady is. He definitely transcends the conventional categories of people  … kind of interesting.

Jule. To me it sounds like theater.

Clare. At the end, humbly, she puts herself in her place. “Who am I to disclose the secret?” I can recognize it and describe it but there’s a greater depth that I cannot plumb. I thought that was sweet how she humbly put herself in that position.

Lucy. Well, she’s also jabbing at the idea that men call it a caterpillar, because she has a pretty secret to tell of the butterfly. More than once, when she writes “but who am I?” – “I’m just a little nobody ….

Tom. Are you saying that she has a different vision of this caterpillar than the men?

Lucy. Maybe. Maybe not just because she’s a woman, or maybe because a woman spends more of her time in the garden …

Elaine. Or dressing for a party.

Greg. And it was the men who were doing the science and writing the dictionaries and giving names to things.

Terry. Overtaking things [laughter].

Jule. There is the lingering question. If men call it a caterpillar, what does she call it? She doesn’t answer that.

Greg. “Fuzzy Fellow?” [laughter]. … The butterfly was a symbol of the resurrection in Christian typology.

Tom. Would there be any validity in seeing this as considering a transition of one form of life to another?

Someone. A Feather on each shoulder suggests the wings of an angel …

Robert. The poem My Cocoon tightens — Colors tease —/ I'm feeling for the Air — gives a sense of that transformation.

Someone. I’m intrigued by the word “secret.” It seems to me that she could also be talking about the mystery of the transformation, that with this there is something mysterious, the way birth is mysterious.

Tom. This next poem is the one that gave me the title.

Jay reads.

Nature — the Gentlest Mother is,
Impatient of no Child —
The feeblest — or the waywardest —
Her Admonition mild —

In Forest — and the Hill —
By Traveller — be heard —
Restraining Rampant Squirrel —
Or too impetuous Bird —

How fair Her Conversation —
A Summer Afternoon —
Her Household — Her Assembly —
And when the Sun go down —

Her Voice among the Aisles
Incite the timid prayer
Of the minutest Cricket —
The most unworthy Flower —

When all the Children sleep —
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light Her lamps —
Then bending from the Sky —

With infinite Affection —
And infiniter Care —
Her Golden finger on Her lip —
Wills Silence — Everywhere —

                      -J790/Fr741/M372

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/4dBLNw1BLK4 ]

Tom. When I first read this , the first word that I zoned in on was – I did not know why she’d choose the word aisles. I think of church, I think of school …

Jay. But not of gardens.

Tom. But not of gardens.

Someone. It could have been a plowed field.

Greg. The crickets are emitting a prayer. You do that in church. In another poem crickets celebrate their unobtrusive Mass.

Someone. How did you read aisles, Tom, when you first read it.

Tom. My notes say “Where is she? A church?” That’s all I have. [laughter]

Jay. In 1863 it could have been a cemetery, too. [general concurrence]

Greg. I love the rampant squirrels.[general agreement and laughter]

Elaine. What surprises me about this poem is that it’s a very gentle poem. Obviously Emily was very appreciative of nature – also very knowledgeable. What surprises me – she’s blocking out the floods, the forest fires ….

Someone. She’s looking at just one aspect of nature. I also think the way she has brought children into this poem is very sweet.

Burleigh. Someone suggested the war before. This sounds like she’s in a very sanctified space – a cemetery. There’s a sense of holiness about it – a blessing on the children here.

Harrison. She talks about nature as being merciful. “With tender majesty/ Her message is committed – to Hands I cannot see. And she goes on to say that she hopes she will be judged tenderly by those who are reading her.

Terry. Dickinson also referred to the Holyoke range as “Our strong Madonnas.” The hills that we can all see.

Victoria. I like what Terry said. There’s that passage in the bible that God cares for every sparrow, so there’s just an overriding benevolence in this poem – that the minutest cricket or the most unworthy little flower in the pasture – it feels to me – everything in the forest and in the hills she overlooks – the gentlest mother, the Madonna – overlooks all of nature in a benevolent way.

Lucy. It also reminds me of that poem How many Flowers fail in Wood/ Or perish from the Hill. The idea that someone is accounting for all of these things.

Someone. You do get an idea in that fourth stanza of some kind of Transcendentalist attitude toward nature in place to some biblical God watching over the sparrow and the lilies of the field

Melba. That final line has something of an ominous note. We’ve been told that nature is the gentlest mother, but her power is immense. She can will silence and has the power over life and death, even if it comes softly. She can take any of these things described out of existence.

Tom. Gentle, but powerful, controlling, always there, everpresent.

Someone. I don’t see the willing silence as overpowering, I see it as inspiring – evoking silence – the awe, the mystery, rather than a threat, or of death.

Someone else. It’s gentle, but it’s still a command.

Victoria. Are there two made-up words, infinite and waywardest?

Greg. “Most wayward” would be grammatically correct.

Tom. That’s interesting. waywardest and infinite would suggest someone who was not adept with the English language, something a child would say.

Harrison. She was just not patient with the English language.

Elaine. The English language is constantly changing. It was certainly spoken differently then.

Victoria. Well, my question is, are these original with her?

[Several] Yes.

Jule. Infiniter. It’s even beyond what we can imagine what we can imagine.

Lucy. It’s interesting to me that although nature has all these jobs, she still has all her domestic jobs, her household, her family.

Harrison. She wants to have it all. [laughter]

Tom. OK, I have a letter to read. This one is letter 185.

Victoria reads.

To Mrs. J.G. Holland early August 1856?

Don't tell, dear Mrs. Holland, but wicked as I am, I read my Bible sometimes, and in it as I read today, I found a verse like this, where friends should "go no more out" and there were "no tears," and I wished as I sat down to-night that we were there - not here - and that wonderful world had commenced, which makes such promises, and rather than write you, I were by your side, and the "hundred and forty and four thousand" where chatting pleasantly, yet not disturbing us. And I'm half tempted to take my seat in that Paradise of which the good man writes, and begin forever and ever now, so wondrous does it seem. My only sketch, profile, of Heaven is a large, blue sky, bluer and larger than the biggest I have seen in June, and in it are my friends - all of them - every one of them - those who are with me now, and those who were "parted" as we walked, and "snatched up to Heaven."

If roses had not faded, and frosts had never come, and one had not fallen here and there whom I could not waken, there were no need of other Heaven than the one below - and if God had been here this summer, and seen the things that I have seen - I guess that He would think His Paradise superfluous. Don't tell Him, for the world, though, for after all He's said about it, I should like to see what He was building for us, with no hammer, and no stone, and no journeyman either. Dear Mrs. Holland, I love, to-night - love you and Dr. Holland, and "time and sense" - and fading things, and things that do not fade.

I'm so glad you are not a blossom, for those in my garden fade, and then a "reaper whose name is Death" has come to get a few to help him make a bouquet for himself, so I'm glad you are not a rose - and I'm glad you are not a bee, for where they go when summer's done, only the thyme knows, and even were you a robin, when the west winds came, you would cooly wink at me, and away, some morning!

As "little Mrs. Holland," then, I think I love you most, and trust that tiny lady will dwell below while we dwell, and when with many a wonder we seek the new Land, her wistful face, with ours, shall look the last upon the hills, and first upon - well, Home!

Pardon my sanity, Mrs. Holland, in a world insane, and love me if you will, for I had rather be loved than to be called a king in earth, or a lord in Heaven.

Thank you for your sweet note - the clergy are very well. Will bring such fragments from them as shall seem me good. I kiss my paper here for you and Dr. Holland - would it were cheeks instead.

Dearly,
Emilie.

p.s.  The bobolinks have gone.

[ To hear Victoria read this letter, go to https://youtu.be/QFdn4aiNv7Y ]

Tom. I didn’t know that “The bobolinks have gone” is a line from a poem that appeared later on. It’s poem 1620.

The Bobolink is gone —
The Rowdy of the Meadow —
And no one swaggers now but me —
The Presbyterian Birds
Can now resume the Meeting
He boldly interrupted that overflowing Day
When supplicating mercy
In a portentous way
He swung upon the Decalogue
And shouted let us pray —
                       -J1591/Fr1620/M646

[ To hear this poem read aloud, to to https://youtu.be/M5lIjad48A0 ]

But, I’m curious. Is she saying here, if God were to look at what we have here on earth, that he might think that anything else would be superfluous. And is that contradicting so much of her other stuff? I don’t think that it is, but I don’t know.

Terry. It’s blasphemous.

Greg. I think you can find several Dickinson poems all points of view from absolute faith to absolute blasphemy. She just writes from different points of view, I think.

Someone. I like the line “Will bring such fragments from them as shall seem me good.” She’s very selective, it seems.

Harrison.

I reckon—when I count at all—

First—Poets—Then the Sun—

Then Summer—Then the Heaven of God—

And then—the List is done—

But, looking back—the First so seems

To Comprehend the Whole—

The Others look a needless Show—

So I write—Poets—All—

Their Summer—lasts a Solid Year—

They can afford a Sun

The East—would deem extravagant—

And if the Further Heaven—

Be Beautiful as they prepare

For Those who worship Them—

It is too difficult a Grace—

To justify the Dream—
                   - J569/Fr533/M292

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/FPdcD9xuWAE ]

Victoria. I like Pardon my sanity, Mrs. Holland, in a world insane. She could write to this friend and say all of these crazy things, and her friend would continue to know her and love her for the wonderful woman that she was, but there’s a lot of people during her life that thought she was “half cracked.”

Tom. What about, I had rather be loved than to be called a king in earth, or a lord in Heaven? One of the things that I thought about when I read this letter, which I did many times – Frost has a poem, Birches,  I'd like to get away from earth awhile/ And then come back to it and begin over. I’m, wondering if she may not be thinking, “It isn’t so bad here, that I’m in a great rush to get to the other place."

Victoria. In her garden and in the woods where she roamed, that was paradise for her. She didn’t really need anything else. She had the biggest blue sky …

Terry. I want to know about the clergy. The clergy show up in the bobolink poem that you cited earlier.

Someone. Is it because of their appearance? Some of them appear to be wearing a black frock, a white surplice?

Clare. The Junkos.

Tom. So, what about the ps. What’s the Bobolink all about?

Harrison. It’s kind of a way of coming down to earth. We’re setting ourselves up for a particular place and time that’s familiar. After the speculation about heaven and earth and all of that it’s time to come back down to familiar things and kind of cool yourself off.

Lucy. Do you think that when she says “Pardon my sanity in a world insane” that she is referencing religion? For her, she’s the one that’s seeing clearly and maybe the Hollands were, too, or maybe they’re just recognizing that there were differences but – what is around us is what we should be focusing on versus what everyone else was concerned about – what was going to happen after you died.

Greg. It reminds one of Much Madness is divinest Sense/ To a discerning Eye/ Much Sense the starkest Madness.

Jule. This was the same time Darwin was forming all of his theories, though he refused to publish ‘til much later. I suspect there were a lot of people asking questions, but not too publicly.

Tom. OK, next one is 1570.

How happy is the little Stone
That rambles in the Road alone,
And doesn't care about Careers
And Exigencies never fears -
Whose Coat of elemental Brown
A passing Universe put on,
And independent as the Sun
Associates or glows alone,
Fulfilling absolute Decree
In casual simplicity –
                     - J1510/Fr1570/635

[ To hear this peem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/1Dutt_yk4hU ]

Harrison. Self-portrait. [general amusement]

Greg. “My barefoot rank is better.

Lucy. It’s so funny – she’s saying how happy is this little stone in the road. If you think about it, you don’t walk around and see a stone in the road and say, “Oh, I want to be you!” Yet, through this poem it seems so delightful, and yes, I want to be that happy little stone. “ … a happy universe put on …” this could be part of her fashion manifesto. [much laughter]

Robert. For me, it captures her happiness in that minute observation.

Tom. So what absolute decree is it fulfilling?

Jay. The absolute decree of existence, I guess.

Tom. Yes, and I was going to say, an existence of simplicity.

Tom. Will someone read 269?

Terry reads:
Dear Friends, " I write to you. I receive no letter. I say * they dignify my trust.' I do not disbelieve. I go again. Cardinals wouldn't do it. Cockneys would n't do it, but I can't stop to strut, in a world where bells toll. I hear through visitor in town, that * Mrs Holland is not strong.' The little peacock in me, tells me not to inquire again. Then I remember my tiny friend " how brief she is " how dear she is, and the peacock quite dies away. Now, you need not speak, for perhaps you are weary, and ' Herod ' requires all your thought, but if you are well " let Annie draw me a little picture of an erect flower; if you are ///, she can hang the flower a little on one side !

Then, I shall understand, and you need not stop to write me a letter. Perhaps you laugh at me! Perhaps the whole United States are laughing at me too! / can't stop for that! My business is to love. I found a bird, this morning, down " down " on a little bush at the foot of the garden, and wherefore sing, I said, since nobody hears?” One sob in the throat, one flutter of bosom " ^My business is to sing ' " and away she rose! How do I know but cherubim, once, themselves, as patient, listened, and applauded her unnoticed hymn? Emily.

Tom. I guess what I saw in this letter, to connect the stone, and the bird that sings but nobody hears. Elegy written in a Country Churchyard, “Full many a flower was born to blush unseen and waste its sweetness on the desert air.” That is Thomas Gray. The beauty is not wasted if it is not observed. Like we read in that first poem, it is. It’s there. The fact that nobody sees it gives it no less significance. I thought that’s how it paired with the stone. It still has value.

Someone. And what is Herod?

Someone else. Does Herod perhaps stand for the business world, the busy world?

Tom. I’m wondering, is she identifying with the bird, also? Because, she was born to sing.

Jay. I think she’s justifying the letter, hoping that it will be seen as singing, not as complaining.

Greg. And she dis speak of her poetry as singing. Hele Hunt Jackson reprimanded her in a letter because she “would not sing aloud.”

Tom. OK. Next is 1618

Robert reads
There came a Wind like a Bugle —

It quivered through the Grass

And a Green Chill upon the Heat

So ominous did pass

We barred the Windows and the Doors

As from an Emerald Ghost —

The Doom's electric Moccasin

That very instant passed —

On a strange Mob of panting Trees

And Fences fled away

And Rivers where the Houses ran

Those looked that lived — that Day —

The Bell within the steeple wild

The flying tidings told —

How much can come

And much can go,

And yet abide the World!
                           -J1593/Fr1618/M645

[ To hear this poem read aloud go to https://youtu.be/hfa3oJuGcu0 ]

 Tom. What is the subject of “abide?” Is it the much that can abide the world?

Greg. I think she’s saying that the world still goes on. I remember these two lines quoted after that terrible disaster in Haiti, years ago.

Tom. Is the moccasin supposed to be the shape of a snake?

Harrison. The moccasin is poisonous a snake that strikes, as the lightning strikes, and can be deadly.

Greg. I thought the moccasin was footwear. [laughter and some concurrence]

Tom. The next one is 1778

High from the earth I heard a bird;
He trod upon the trees
As he esteemed them trifles,
And then he spied a breeze,
And situated softly
Upon a pile of wind
Which in a perturbation
Nature had left behind.
A joyous-going fellow
I gathered from his talk,
Which both of benediction
And badinage partook,
Without apparent burden,
I learned, in leafy wood
He was the faithful father
Of a dependent brood;
And this untoward transport
His remedy for care,—
A contrast to our respites.
How different we are!
                    - J1723/Fr1778/M687

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/tjY5Q9DAcLs ]

The scansion of the poem is complicated.

Greg. For us, the care of a brood could seem burdensome, but for the bird it is transport, there’s nothing he’d rather be doing.

Terry. She speaks as if she’s in communication with him.  I gatered from, his talk …That’s fabulous, isn’t it? She talks with the birds.

Emily Dickinson Reading Circle 08 January 2016

Emily Dickinson Reading Circle, 08 January 2016

Guest Speaker Alice Parker

We started with a brief look at 

When Etna basks and purrs
Naples is more afraid
Then when she shows her Garnet Tooth —
Security is loud —
              -J1146/Fr1161/M705

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/O7r79Ln8xJg  ]

[ Margaret told us that a certain critic saw non-recoverable deletion in this poem, and was asked to define that term. ]

Margaret: Well, if I say “Mary ran home and cooked supper,” who cooked supper?

Answer: Mary

Margaret: Well, how do you know that? It doesn’t say that.

Answer: It’s inferred.

Margaret: That’s a recoverable deletion. In the syntactical grammar of English, you can delete something as long as you can find it. A non-recoverable deletion would indicate, linguistically, that the sentence was ungrammatical. I don’t know why this critic sees non-recoverable deletions in this poem.

Greg. I don’t see it here at all.

Alice. Security from what?

Margaret. And Naples is more afraid of what?

Answers. The eruption. The volcano.

Margaret. It’s funny – when Winnie emailed me she asked, “Did she just make a mistake, because Etna’s in Sicily and not in Naples, or was it deliberate on her part?” I thought, the volcano could be so huge that it could reach Naples. She wouldn’t make a mistake like that, would she?

Greg. Oh, she knew her geography, but I don’t think she cares about geographical accuracy.

Alice. Naples is that wonderful Greek word, synechdoche, where one thing is used to stand for the general or vice versa.

Nick. Rhythmically you couldn’t have Sicily anyway.

Someone. And they’re more afraid of the possibility than of the reality. When Etna is basking and purring they don’t know what’s going to happen next.

Margaret. And why basking? Is she thinking of a cat?

All. Cats like to bask in the sun and they purr. She knew that. Her sister had many cats.

Margaret M. But isn’t there something geothermally correct about this too? – that when it’s spewing lava it’s less dangerous than it making ominous rumbling sounds?

Barri. Would she have been inspired by something that happened at that time?

Margaret. When was the eruption? It was an active volcano, and of course she was interested in volcanoes, right? What’s the garnet tooth?

Margaret M. That’s the lava, and I’m pretty sure that it’s less dangerous then than when you have a tight cap on it which blows.

Margaret. And Margaret, are you saying that because of the last line?

Margaret M. Yes.

Margaret. Do you want to elaborate on that?

Margaret M. Well, a garnet tooth is loud compared to bask and purr, but loud is a poetic way of saying something a little bit differently. It’s a sight, but she makes it a sound. I think she does so because it almost rhymes with afraid. [general amusement]

Barri. But it’s also loud when the volcano erupts. It’s a huge noise.

Margaret. But you’re saying that security is safer – because notice the more. It’s more afraid than the security of something actually happening.

Margaret M. I think it’s the security of that garnet tooth. It’s a comparative security. You can see it, what it’s doing there. But when you can’t see anything and it’s just rumbling …

Margaret. Do you know that fits so well with Dickinson’s whole preference for anticipation over realization?

Nick. I don’t think it’s uncommon that the fear of something is often greater than the reality,

Leslie. [following up on researching the number of Etna eruptions] There are just so many eruptions. It seems that they’re becoming a lot more frequent. When Dickinson was writing, there was one in 1852, 63, 65, 79 which was after, so the biggest one seems to have been in 1863, a central crater eruption and it produced ash=fall on its southwestern flank in south-eastern Sicily, but she didn’t mind. [laughter]

Greg. Well, another poem begins “Volcanoes be in Sicily and South America,” so, she knew.

Alice reads:

What shall I do when the Summer troubles—
What, when the Rose is ripe—
What when the Eggs fly off in Music
From the Maple Keep?

What shall I do when the Skies a'chirrup
Drop a Tune on me—
When the Bee hangs all Noon in the Buttercup
What will become of me?

Oh, when the Squirrel fills His Pockets
And the Berries stare
How can I bear their jocund Faces
Thou from Here, so far?

'Twouldn't afflict a Robin—
All His Goods have Wings—
I—do not fly, so wherefore
My Perennial Things?
                           - J956/Fr915/M430

[  To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/ncpI_ELXDDs  ]

So “What can I do when the summer troubles?” So it’s “I,” she’s upset by some thought. What’s going on in the seasons is affecting her. I love “From the Maple Keep” – Keep in the sense of a strongbox or something that you keep things in, and the maple trees keep the maple syrup.

Margaret. Couldn’t she possibly be identifying herself with winter?

Alice. Oh, I hadn’t gotten that far. She has so many wonderful poems of winter.

Margaret. And the Robin. “I dreaded that first Robin so” What can winter do when summer and spring and fall are active. Where am I? What will become of me? Then at the end, I do not fly.

Greg. Wherefore is “why.” “Why my perennial things?”

Alice. Oh, here’s the one I was looking for. Let me just read it if you’re thinking about her relationship to winter.

'Twas here my summer paused
What ripeness after then
To other scene or other soul
My sentence had begun.

To winter to remove
With winter to abide
Go manacle your icicle
Against your Tropic Bride.
                       - J1756/Fr1771/M685

That would bear out what you’re saying about her identification with winter.

Nick. In that last line at the end, she’s wondering what it would be like at these other seasons. Winter troubles me, and I wonder wherefore my perennial things, but what will I wonder and so on when I’m troubled in these other seasons. I see it as a four season poem, and that she’s really depressed. The one thing I keep hearing about is what she’s feeling. I mean, that’s what poetry’s about, it’s feeling. It’s not about analyzing with the left brain. Sorry Margaret [laughter]. But what is she feeling and what does this all lead to and I think she’s really feeling depressed, maybe alone, and she’s wondering “Am I going to be depressed in the summer, am I going to be depressed in the fall?” As I am now, and wondering, what is the point of all these things.

Alice. This certainly isn’t a spring poem or a summer poem in the sense of rejoicing and of creation. She’s rejoicing in a sense, but they also hurt her. She feels this stab when the birds begin to sing in the morning, and what will become of me? What do I have to hang onto. Where’s my context?

Margaret. That is something all we human beings share – we ask “What is our purpose in life?” – and that is something that the other creatures that we share the world with don’t have. They’re sufficient unto themselves, they live their lives. Look at Beau [a dog]; he knows exactly who he is.

Burleigh. But our own personal perennial markers are more – I mean, the animals are migrating for food, for warmth – the first thought that I had was fall and going back to school, and holidays. The animals don’t have that.

Barbara. What makes me sad about this poem is thinking about perennial things, I think of plants that come every year and robins return every year, although they’re not necessarily the same birds but the cycle – and the sadness for me is that there isn’t going to be any replacement for me when I’m gone. I’m not perennial. So she could be thinking that she’s not going to be here every year to see this cycle, and that may be why she’s a little wistful.

Margaret. And why she’s identified herself with winter – because winter is the symbol for death, right?

Sandy. Maybe her perennial things are her poems.

Nick. If that’s so Sandy, and I can well see that in here, then I think she’s asking, “What the hell is the point of all these things I’ve written?” – because that’s a very common question for a writer. I’ve just finished a biography of Thomas Hardy, one of the greatest poets in the English language and nobody reads him. How many here have read more than two or three poems by Hardy? Some - most poets, from the sixties until now think he’s the greatest English poet.

Margaret. Oh Donald Hall says The Transformation is his favorite poem.

Nick. But that is a very common thought for all writers

Sandy. And all creative people. “Is it going to outlast me?”

Alice. I think that is a very self-centered viewpoint, and I think that this whole poem is about something much broader. I don’t think she considers to herelf that she specifically is not going to be here. Her existence in the whole [?] of humankind is like that of a bird. All you can do is live in the time that you’re in.

Margaret. I think that you’re all right, that the tone of this poem is not a joyous one.

Nick. The agony is with the perennial. Not the future, not the past, because it keeps coming around and she’s still feeling it.

Greg. I can hear a sorrowful tone in the poem, but still it’s beautiful. [general agreement]

Margaret M. I think all of us have had this experience, especially if you love nature. There are times when you cannot reach that love. You can’t feel it. That first line, “What shall I do when the summer troubles, instead of when the summer’s here or something….

Margaret. Well, I hate to get back to something that might not be broad enough, but for me, iconicity is the motivating force for all art, including poetry, and iconicity is that attempt to identify with the world – to make the connection between being and the world, and that the world and you are apart and all those subliminal sensory and emotional experiences that you have and you’re not aware of are what come through in the arts. And those experiences are what make a part of the world. If you lose that sense of trust and faith that’s possible, then you get into this kind of tone, where you lose it for a minute. … the first line gets right to Margaret’s meaning, it asks, “What shall I do when the summer troubles,” it doesn’t say that it does it all the time.

Greg. A little off the track here, but, I think if the poem had begun with the second line, that would be a non-recoverable deletion. “shall I do” could be guessed, but other possibilities would still exist.

Margaret. Alice, how would you set “Drop a tune on me?” It seems that that would be something that you would want, but now it’s troubling.

Alice. Oh, I don’t think so. I think she’s affirming that everything that’s out there is just beautiful, and it’s that distance from her – how she relates to that.

Margaret. To me, What shall I do when the Summer troubles and What shall I do when the Skies a'chirrup are parallel.

Greg. After she masters the robin in I dreaded that first Robin so, she has the line Not all Pianos in the Woods/ Have power to mangle me. The music in the woods would have been painful.

Alice. Oh, and there are other poems about the birdsong – the dagger in the heart.

Leslie. I’ve been wondering if “Thou” refers to God. If you’re religious and you believe that God has created nature in symmetry where everything evolves in a cycle that is repetitive and sometimes troubling but that it has its place, and her response to that is “Where are my perennial things?” Where’s my cycle, where’s my place vis a vis nature?

Greg. Try reading it as if it’s to you. I love it that way.

Margaret. What I love about it is that this is a perfect example of a multiply recoverable deletion. You can read it as Thou being God, or summer …

Greg, But it’ recoverable grammatically, but if the poem began with the second line, you would not be able to recover anything grammatically. Yeah, we don’t know who Thou is; it could be anybody. It’s whoever you want it to be.

Margaret. I want to get back to wherefore. I want to know why she chose that word.

Greg. In an early poem she asks, Wherefore mine eye thy silver mist/ Wherefore Oh summer’s day?

Margaret. In Johnson 489 [Franklin 476] she has Who saw them—Wherefore fly? That’s interesting. We pray—to Heaven is the first line.

We pray—to Heaven—
We prate—of Heaven—
Relate—when Neighbors die—
At what o'clock to heaven—they fled—
Who saw them—Wherefore fly?

Is Heaven a Place—a Sky—a Tree?
Location's narrow way is for Ourselves—
Unto the Dead
There's no Geography—

But State—Endowal—Focus—
Where - Omnipresence—fly?

                          -J489/Fr476/M237

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/zo-r60zaXjk ]

Nick. Well I’m going to be interested to see what you do when every line has the first beat on the first syllable.

Alice. That’s no problem.

Nick. Yes, but it’s atypical. The natural beat in English is iambic. ba-BOM ba-BOMN ba-Bom

Greg. Double double toil and trouble. [laughter]

Alice. The next poem we’re going to do is 1789 in Franklin [Johnson 1764]

The saddest noise, the sweetest noise,
The maddest noise that grows,—
The birds, they make it in the spring,
At night’s delicious close.

Between the March and April line—
That magical frontier
Beyond which summer hesitates,
Almost too heavenly near.

It makes us think of all the dead
That sauntered with us here,
By separation’s sorcery
Made cruelly more dear.

It makes us think of what we had,
And what we now deplore.
We almost wish those siren throats
Would go and sing no more.

An ear can break a human heart
As quickly as a spear,
We wish the ear had not a heart
So dangerously near.
                         -J1764/Fr1789/M690

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/HVw3BEEzmp4 ]

Margaret. There’s a lost manuscript that was published in the Republican in 1898, attributed to Dickinson.

Barri. You said the second stanza wasn’t her wording. I have it written down here.

Alice. Too heavenly does not sound like Dickinson

Margaret. Too heavenly, that’s right.

Barri. Sauntered was an atypical usage.

Greg. Saunter is the word Thoreau used. He wouldn’t go on a hike or a walk; he’d saunter. She might have picked that up from him.

Nick. Reginald Cook wrote about Henry David Thoreau; it’s called “A Concord Saunterer.” In fact in his essay on walking he describes his saunters.

Esther. My mother always used to tell me, “Get a move on Esther, don’t saunter. [laughter]

Greg. The word doesn’t have quite the merry ring for you then, does it. [laughter]

Nick. Henry argues in his essay on walking that if you’re not sauntering, you’re not appreciating where you are.

Margaret M. None of that power walking for him.

Alice. I like saunter here because the minute she says It makes us think of all the Dead we’re right into melancholy, and then saunter picks you up right away from that.

Margaret. “with us here.
”

Alice. Yes, you’re back in the present, and the presence.

Margaret M. I just think this poem is The saddest noise, the sweetest noise,The maddest noise that grows.

Margaret. Now that Bari has thrown that doubt into my mind, I’m not even sure that this is a Dickinson poem.

Alice. You’re not sure?

Greg. I think some of it is, anyway. The March and April line?

Margaret.. I may have been edited, and we just don’t have the original manuscript.

Esther. At night’s delicious close. That sure sound’s like her [general agreement]

Alice. Yes, [?]that endless hour before dawn, and then the birds awaken you even before the light changes.

Margaret. Magical Frontier is very much Dickinson, the way she uses magic – magic prison.

Greg. Who else but her, after contemplating all the wonders of nature, would remark, “It makes me think of all the dead?” [laughter]

Nick. And the sirens, right? She compares them to the singing of the sirens.

Margaret M. But she could be thinking of the dead. Thou could be someone that died.

Margaret. It’s interesting that she identifies Magical Frontier with Separation’s Sorcery. … and you know, I’m beginning to think that it was edited, because look at the rhymes. They’re too good. [meaning exact].

Alice. But I do like Any ear can break a human heart.

Margaret. Exactly. It reminds me of Not with a Club the heart is broken. I used to use that when we were playing hearts. [laughter].

Alice. To get us out of this broken heart feeling, we have to go to a spring poem, and I couldn’t help but thinking of A little madness in the spring.

A little Madness in the Spring

Is wholesome even for the King,

But God be with the Clown —

Who ponders this tremendous scene —

This whole Experiment of Green —

As if it were his own!
                       - J1333/Fr1356/M586

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/eUyzhTx6Et0 ]

Sandy. I did a painting of it. It’s a combination of a trillium, because that’s one of the first flowers; it’s a diptych, and the other side is a partridge drumming, because I think that’s the maddest sound in the wood [laughter]. It’s like a chainsaw going off.

Barbara. Alice, when you’re working with poems to set them to music, do you ever consult with Margaret about variants?

Alice. I should. I love variants, and there was something in that poem about heavenly hurt where I went and looked up everything, but most of the time, I don’t worry.

Margaret. The reason I like the variants is that I don’t trust the editors. Sometimes they’re right, but I like to choose my own to understand the poem. That happens with A little madness, and also He preached opon breadth, where she has so many variants for To meet so enabled a Man.

Alice. I want to move on to Brooks of Steel

Like Brooms of Steel

The Snow and Wind

Had swept the Winter Street —

The House was hooked

The Sun sent out

Faint Deputies of Heat —

Where rode the Bird

The Silence tied

His ample — plodding Steed

The Apple in the Cellar snug

Was all the one that played.

[ To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/v6mixq0zQOI 
See also "Emily Dickinson as a Second Language: Demystifying the Poetry," by 

Greg Mattingly, p 193 ]

This is 20 below zero, after the ice storm, and everything is silent. The house was hooked. There’s and interesting word.

Greg. The shutters. They’re fastened with hooks.

Alice. Where rode the bird. In the sky – the bird isn’t there now – there was silence. The only place that’s warm is the cellar, where the apple is turning into cider.

Bari. Can you talk about those last lines? I’m looking at the image of the apple in the cellar and there’s something I’m not getting here.

Greg. I looked up the word play in her dictionary and it is defined there as “Rest; relax; enjoy leisure; take a break from labor”

Margaret M. Didn’t they store apples in some matrix?

Margaret. My father always stored apples on a frame that had air underneath it. They have to be cold.

Nick. When I stored apples in a New England farmhouse – it had a stone foundation – I wrapped each apple in paper and stored them in a box – as long as they’re not touching one another.

Alice. The next poem is 465 in Franklin [Johnson 656]

The name — of it — is "Autumn" —
The hue — of it — is Blood —
An Artery — upon the Hill —
A Vein — along the Road —

Great Globules — in the Alleys —
And Oh, the Shower of Stain —
When Winds — upset the Basin —
And spill the Scarlet Rain —

It sprinkles Bonnets — far below —
It gathers ruddy Pools —
Then — eddies like a Rose — away —
Upon Vermilion Wheels —
                         -J656/Fr465/M233

[  To hear this poem read aloud, go to https://youtu.be/92z39XKeoX8 ]

Margaret. There is a variant. She has tip the scarlet rain, with tip followed by a mark – I don’t like to use the word dash – I’m thinking of your silences, Alice. In line ten, instead of gathers, she has stands in, also followed by a mark. Interesting, again she’s separating that from ruddy Pools. Oh, and she also has a variant of gathers ruddy – makes vermillion followed by another mark, then for the last line And leaves me with the Hills.So, she was obviously working on the whole poem, not just an odd line

…

Nick. She refers back to the first stanza with that last line. I guess the only way we know what the marks look like is to look at the manuscripts.

Margaret. Yes, and they’re all on line now, at Amherst College special collections, and at the Houghton library at Harvard University. … Do you want to talk about spaces in this poem? You said it was noisy.

Alice. There’s so much action in this poem. The name of it is Autumn is passive. The hue of it is Blood – when blood spills that’s obviously [?]. And the artery upon the hill – the artery flows very red up on the hill and Vein along the Road, veins are blue, purple, asters? – in the fall, along the road? Great Globules, wonderful syllables!

Margaret. And spill the scarlet Rain – all those leaves coming down.

Alice. It sprinkles Bonnets far below, that the first human element if we are thinking humans with bonnets on, or maybe it’s the flowers, or mushrooms or something. And Then eddies like arose away-

Several. That’s like the petals falling in a progression

Leslie. I was very troubled by this poem. This poem is very troubling to me. The first two stanzas make me feel like I’m in a battleground – like a battle of the Civil War, and I look around and see just blood and corpses everywhere, and to me it was just so dark.

Greg. I wasn’t going to mention it but it has been interpreted as a Civil War poem.

Nick. Well then what are the Vermillion Wheels doing?

Margaret. Langer [Suzanne K. Langer (1953. Feeling and Form. New York: Charles Scribner’s)] has a statement that unless the artist is actually dealing with conflict of tone and emotion, and in some cases they are – they’re in conflict, there’s only one tone. And from a cognitive point of view, if you’ve missed that tone, you’ve missed the poem. So, coming back to the difference between Leslie’s idea of The name of it is Autumn, and Alice’s putting it into the context of noise and everything else – before the silence – one could perhaps say that in this particular poem that Dickinson herself, as a poet, was feeling a certain conflict – the conflict between the absolute headiness of autumn – everybody comes here to see the wonderful foliage – and yet we know that it presages winter, and so there’s always a conflict in fall. Then you start thinking of the heaviness that Leslie sees – she could be thinking both, she could be ambivalent. So the rhythm of the poem, and the choice of words could be saying two different things. They are, I suppose.

Sandy. It’s deceptive at first when you read through it.

Margaret. The first line says that the name of it is Autumn – but what is it really? It’s not what we think of when we think of Autumn