Emily Dickinson Reading Circle September, 2018

Emily Dickinson Reading Circle

September, 2018

Topic: Flowers

Facilitated by Greg Mattingly

Greg.
If recollecting were forgetting,

Then I remember not.

And if forgetting, recollecting,

How near I had forgot.

And if to miss, were merry,

And to mourn, were gay,

How very blithe the fingers

That gathered this, Today!      [ Greg presents a calla lily ]
                        - J33/Fr9/M40

Calla lily! I'm learning slowly. [ laughter ] Is everyone familiar with that account of Emily Dickinson first meeting Colonel Higginson, placing two day lilies in his hand and saying "These are my introduction? Yes she did - always completely opaque to me - until I read this:

It seems likely, however, that the day lily that ED offered Higginson were more closely associated with herself than was the white calla lily. Emily Ford (a friend of hers) recalled that "When we girls named each other flowers, and I called Lavinia a pond lily, Emily answered so quickly, 'I am cow lily!' referring to the orange lights in her hair and eyes. Her cow lily is what we call today the common orange, or day lily."

Sandy. Wow.

Greg. Yeah. I've seen pictures of it, with the orange in it, but I couldn't find one. Hannaford's [supermarket] didn't have one. Judith Farr has a picture of one in her wonderful book [holding up a copy of "The Gardens of Emily Dickinson" ]. This is one of the sources I used to put this stuff together, and also "Emily Dickinson's Garden," by Marta McDowell, who has now become Gardner-in-Residence at the [Emily Dickinson] museum.

Margaret. Greg, did you talk about the language of flowers at all - what the day lily stands for?

Greg. No, not in this particular - it's funny, when I told one of the guides that I was putting something together like this, she said, "You're going to be able to do a whole thing on just that? [laughter] Yeah, so I really had to cut way, way down. I do have a chapter in my book on Victorian Flower Language, and I didn't prepare any of that for here. The day lily has two different meanings in Victorian Flowers Language. One is "coquetry," and it's hard to imagine Dickinson playing the coquette to the august, married, Thomas Wentworth Higginson. The other was something like "friendship;" something more applicable, I think. Those dictionaries have different definitions - different meanings for different flowers. I was explaining to some people earlier that I started on this because I'm completely ignorant about flowers and gardening, and, it occurred to me that if I explored it, s best I could, that I'd maybe pick up a little more of what Dickinson was saying. And I had no idea. It's the most profound exploration of her work that I've ever done. It transformed my whole consciousness.

Leslie. Are you looking at the symbolism there?

Greg. Yeah, in the nineteenth century, there were catalogues, books, and manuals on the significance, or the meaning of each flower. In Victorian ties, when they were more restrained in the outward expression of their emotions, they would sometimes use flowers to get the message across.

Alice. It pre-dates the nineteenth century. It goes back to the renaissance and to Shakespeare.

Greg. Oh, yeah. “There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember!” from Hamlet. Rosemary was for remembrance

Margaret. Well, the white lily is "supreme womanhood." That would be the highest compliment.

Esther. That would be the Easter lily, would it?

Margaret. That would be the white Madonna lily, yes. They say that Lewis Carroll. in "Through the Looking Glass," gives the tiger lily - which is what Emily had in her hands, right? - an imperious character. "The lily is rude to the daisy, larkspur, and violet. Only the rose it it's equal.

Greg. So, when I started out, I read this sentence from one of her letters. Get this. This is a letter to Mrs. E J Loomis, Mabel Loomis Todd's mother. "My acquaintance with the irreparable dates from the death-bed of a young flower, to which I was deeply attached." I read that, and I took it literally, and, so does Judith Farr, and so does another critic, Stephanie Kingley - read it literally; she's talking about a flower. Someone at the museum thought it might be her little nephew, Gib, who died. Someone else there said, "Greg, she exaggerates. I think that's a little tongue-in-cheek." So, I can't say definitively what Dickinson is saying in this particular case, but, it got me started, because that intensity of feeling runs all through all of this stuff. So, we have a list of poems

Edith reads.
So has a Daisy vanished
From the fields today -
So tiptoed many a slipper
To Paradise away -

Oozed so in crimson bubbles
Day's departing tide -
Blooming - tripping - flowing
Are ye then with God?
                        - J28/Fr19/M39

Greg. What's this poem saying?

Leslie. Is it about a person, or a flower? Something died and went away during the summer.

Sandy. She regards the flower as a special being, along with humans. They die, and then they come back again the following year. She's saying these flowers, the Daixy9 and the slipper have died and to their paradise, wherever that may be. And Oozed so in crimson bubbles, that would be - the sunset? - I would presume - but maybe I'm wrong. Blooming - tripping - flowing/ Are ye then with God? She's questioning whether they go to heaven as well.

Ellen. But, did anyone check to see if it's a person or a flower?

Greg. How do you check? Well, the reason I chose this poem is that I found three very different readings of it among the scholars.

Edith. I took Oozed so in crimson bubbles literally. You know, after a flower dies, it gets really slimy. I thought it was literally what happens to the flower after it dies.

Greg. There's a critic - I think it's Robert Weisbuch - who reads it that way. Whet's describing the death of the flower - in his reading - as evanescent, like slippers tiptoeing away - the evanescence of the sunset - that was one reading of it.

Margaret. Also, I think one should notice, So has a Daisy vanished, So tiptoed many a slipper. That "So" sets up an analogy that , "just as flowers," Are ye then with God? And, it's followed in the fascicle by the very next poem in Franklin, "If those I loved were lost." Let me read it to you, because it's not clear, in the fascicle, whether it's the same poem - it has the same structure.

If those I loved were lost,

the crier's voice would tell me -

If those I loved were found,

the bells of Ghent would ring,

Did those I loved repose,

the Daisy would impel me -

Philip when bewildered -

bore his riddle in -
                        - J29/Fr20/M39

Marion. Who's Philip?

Greg. Most people think that that was the apostle Philip, who said "Show us the Father" to Jesus.

Wendy. Ok, so Oozed so in crimson bubbles - I had a kind of Jesus feel about that. I know the music of that period, and there's allot about the "crimson blood." It's just kind of a standard image of crucifixion, so I decided to venture that, but maybe I should just keep quiet.

Margaret. I think what it show us, really, is that what seems like a very simple poem has layers of complexity, so that it's both flower and life - human life - and with some elements of theology, yeah.

Greg. Here's David Porter. "Line 7 summarizes line 1 to 6. Emily knows that someone's death was as unobtrusive as the disappearance of a daisy in bloom, as light, tripping feet, walking on tiptoe, as flowing as the ebbtide at sunset." But, is the person with God. So, that's like the reading you took.

Margaret. Also, for me, the slipper is the lady slipper, a local flower after all.

Greg. And then, there's George Mamunes' So has a Daisy vanished: Emily Dickinson and tuberculosis."

Margaret. That's where the blood comes in.

Greg. " 'Oozed so in crimson bubbles' in the context of a poem describing death can be read as a nod to TB, a hemorrhage of frothy blood escaping the lungs and oozing from the lips." Now, how can you get three more different readings than that? [general assent]. ...

Wendy reads.
So bashful when I spied her!

So pretty—so ashamed!

So hidden in her leaflets

Lest anybody find—

So breathless till I passed here—

So helpless when I turned

And bore her struggling, blushing,

Her simple haunts beyond!

For whom I robbed the Dingle—

For whom I betrayed the Dell—

Many, will doubtless ask me,

But I shall never tell!
                        - J91/Fr70/M53

Margaret. It's interesting, isn't it, that that So in this poem is so different from the So in the other poem [So has a Daisy vanished].

Helen. This is about a flower, then, of some sort?

Margaret. Oh yes, definitely.

Helen. A wildflower, then. It's under the leaves.

Mary Clare. She plucked it.

Margaret. She robbed the Dingle. The arbutus is one of the earliest flowers, and it grows under the leaves ...

Leslie. But, is that a flower someone would pluck? It's so small.

Alice. My mother always did. She was collecting for nosegays.

Greg. Isn't it remarkable how she assigns such human attributes to the flower? I'm told that the arbutus starts out white, and then turns pink.

Pink -- small -- and punctual --
Aromatic -- low --
Covert -- in April --
Candid -- in May --
Dear to the Moss --
Known to the Knoll --
Next to the Robin
In every human Soul --
Bold little Beauty
Bedecked with thee
Nature forswears
Antiquity --
It's the trailing arbutus.
                        - J1332/Fr357/M587

Sarah. Yeah, it seems so Emily Dickinson, because she wouldn't be a showy flower - she would be something quiet, unassuming, that you would have to look for her, to seek her out.

Greg. Yeah, she called herself ":Daisy" sometimes. Alright, in the first poem the Daisy was, at least in my reading, a person. In the poem we just read, I think we all agree refers to some flower, at least, and in the next poem, the flower actually becomes a maid.

Sandy reads.
Baffled for just a day or two—

Embarrassed—not afraid—

Encounter in my garden

An unexpected Maid.

She beckons, and the woods start—

She nods, and all begin—

Surely, such a country

I was never in!
                        - J17/Fr66/M50

Greg. This was sent to Mrs. Holland with a rosebud attached.

Wendy. So as we to assume that this refers to a rosebud, just because she sent one with it?

Margaret. Judith Farr and I, quite independently, came to the conclusion that Dickinson identified with herself, a flower, and a poem. :So, there are lots of flower poems, where would send a poem with a flower in lieu of a flower, or a flower, and herself as part of that offering, which fits with the Higginson thing, right? - where she's offering two day lilies.

Alice. I like the way she uses this one symbol, and she sticks to it. That's why we can bring all these different readings to it - is that she just gives these elusive hints. You can never pin it down.

Greg. Judith Farr speculates that she might have encountered the rosebud surprisingly early in the season. The word "embarrass," in her dictionary, is defined first as "to perplex; to render intricate; to entangle; or to perplex as to the mind or intellectual faculties; confuse." So "embarrass" is not to be ashamed in any way, but more like, "What's this doing here? I'm confused, I'm losing my bearings."

Nan. So, She beckons, and the woods start.

Barre. Spring scents.

Greg, Oh, that's nice. [ general appreciation ]

Margaret. I notice these are very early poems. She was very young.

Greg. The last lines seem to say to me that she's just so astonished, it's as if she's never seen such a fine display.

Wendy. I thought is was also something like a political metaphor. Like, this is the country that she likes - where the rose rules, and the woods all go, like, "Whatever you say ma'am."

Greg. Yes, the way these poems are lined up, there are some very simple ones. they could almost be dismissed as trite - schlock - until you read them more closely - and then we advance into some more mature poems as we head in, I think. - Such as!

Jenna reads.
Pigmy seraphs — gone astray —

Velvet people from Vevay —

Belles from some lost summer day —

Bees exclusive Coterie —

Paris could not lay the fold     [ Dressmaker ]

Belted down with Emerald —

Venice could not show a check

Of a tint so lustrous meek —

Never such an Ambuscade

As of briar and leaf displayed

For my little damask maid —

I had rather wear her grace

Than an Earl's distinguished face —

I had rather dwell like her

Than be "Duke of Exeter" —

Royalty enough for me

To subdue the Bumblebee.
                        - J138/Fr96/M62

Esther. Remind me again, are seraphs like angels?

Greg. The highest kind of angel.

Wendy. What is Vevay?

Greg. Vevay is a resort town in Switzerland. It was visited by Samuel Bowles. He wrote to Sue and Austin from Vevey, which he spelled with a "a," V-e-v-a-y," and Emily picked up the spelling evidently from him, from that letter.

Margaret. And then there's that word so again. I wonder if it's a sign of early Emily.

Greg, Yeah, sometimes it means "thus," and sometimes it's just - "

Margaret. Yeah, the analogy.

Sandy. What's ta tint so lustrous meek?

Jenna. A damask rose?

Greg. I think it is the damask rose, because it's identified in the verse.

Margaret. And the briar,

Myrtle. There's also a silk-like material called damask,

Margaret. I love the comparison of the flower and couture - the dresses of Paris. French fashion, you know?  "This is so superior to anything that France could produce." [laughter]

Alice. I like the Bumblebee at the end. Gets right back down there. [laughter]

Wendy. She really does identify with the role of the damask in those last few lines. I get a chill from those lines.

Esther. What is an Ambuscade

Greg. An ambush, but also a place from which an ambush is launched.

Margaret. Exeter is another reference, isn't it?

Greg. Yeah, I looked that up. Exeter  has a very special place in royal history. I'm pretty vague on  that.

Margaret. Oh, and the Duke of Exeter was one of Elizabeth's [Elizabeth the First] probable lovers, so, Royalty enough for me/ To subdue the Bumblebee., so, there's that whole sexual thing going on between the bee and the flower. She's absolutely identifying with the rose.

Greg. Yeah, that's a regular motif of hers. Yeah, we're gonna meet the bees again. [laughter]. OK, next poem ...

Alice reads.
Because the Bee may blameless hum
For Thee a Bee do I become
List even unto Me.

Because the Flowers unafraid
May lift a look on thine, a Maid
Alway a Flower would be.

Nor Robins, Robins need not hide
When Thou upon their Crypts intrude
So Wings bestow on Me
Or Petals, or a Dower of Buzz
That Bee to ride, or Flower of Furze
I that way worship Thee
                        - J869/Fr909/M458

Greg. So, what's the message here? Who is Thee?

Alice. I know, That's our to question, hers to know.

Greg. I'm reminded of what Margaret was saying about how she identified with the flowers, and here she wants actually to become a flower - but why?

Margaret. Isn't she making herself both the flower and the bee in this poem? Either way, she's going to worship the person she's writing to.

Greg. And the Robin, too. "If I were a robin, I wouldn't have to hide."

Barre. Talk about the word Crypts too, because I know it can be a basement hiding place. I didn't quite get how to use that. Not a tomb.

Margaret. Wouldn't it be equivalent to the the robin's nest?

Barre. It is, but why did she choose that?

Greg. Could it stand for any hiding place?

Linda. What does Furze refer to?

Esther. Furze is a spiny yellow flowering evergreen shrub growing on wasteland.

Alice. So, she wants wings, and petals ...

Linda. And she wants to be unafraid, like the flower.

Greg. The wings of the robin, the petals of the flower, the buzz of a bee; as any one of those, she might approach, blameless,

[interlude]

Margaret reads.
They ask but our Delight —
The Darlings of the Soil
And grant us all their Countenance
For a penurious smile.
                        -J868/Fr908/M438

I talk about this in a paper, actually, because, what's interesting here - it starts off so sloppy and sentimental. Countenance is a Latin word - has a Biblical resonance as opposed to the Germanic smile. And grant us sounds Biblical, too, doesn't it? And penurious if from a Latin word meaning "penury." It's semantically ambiguous. (Grant us all) their Countenance, or Grant us (all their Countenance). [crosstalk]

Greg. They're giving us everything, we're giving them a cheap little smile. It's kind of heartfelt, isn't it? - for the flower.

Wendy. I'm imagining she's in her garden with a bunch of people who aren't really into gardening. and they're just "Ho-hum, what lovely flowers," and she's just flipping out, saying "Oh! These things are amazing!"

Esther. Countenance can mean facial expression, too. You greet the world with a smiling countenance.

Greg. We'll run into flower's countenance in another poem, too. Let's see what we make of the next one.

Linda reads.
'Tis Sunrise — Little Maid — Hast Thou
No Station in the Day?
'Twas not thy wont, to hinder so —
Retrieve thine industry —

'Tis Noon — My little Maid —
Alas — and art thou sleeping yet?
The Lily — waiting to be Wed —
The Bee — Hast thou forgot?

My little Maid — 'Tis Night — Alas
That Night should be to thee
Instead of Morning — Had'st thou broached
Thy little Plan to Die —
Dissuade thee, if I could not, Sweet,
I might have aided — thee —
                        - J908/Fr832/M410

Margaret. This is in fascicle 40, which we discussed last year. It's a very complicated fascicle. So Greg?

Greg. what's the little maid?

Lynn. A dead flower.

Margaret. I think it's a dying child.

Greg. Here's David Porter:
"The little Maid of this poem could just about be taken as a person whom Emily visits three times on the day of her death, with lines seven and eight referring to her jobs in the garden that day. But it is more likely that, as in poem 17, the little Maid is a flower in Emily's garden At sunrise, she's still closed fast, and not opening to meet the sun. At noon the flower still droops, in stead of being a fit partner for a Lily, or the quarry for a Bee. At nightfall Emily realizes that the flower's completely dead, and will not see another Morning. If Emily has only been told that death was imminent, she might have been able to help the flower."

Wendy. That's pretty literal.

Margaret. I think that's egregious. [laughter] David was my thesis adviser. [laughter] I think, at the end, it's very sobering. If I couldn't dissuade you from dying, I might have helped you die. It's much more sobering.

Esther. What does she mean by dissuaded?

Greg. Well, if it's a flower, she might have cut it and put it in a vase, or deadheaded it.

Wendy. I kind of agree with Margaret. Comparing that to the idea that, if I couldn't have dissuaded you from dying, I could have helped you - that's so moving - as opposed to "I could have enjoyed you for a while in a vase.

Greg. This is a measure of the intensity of her feelings for, and her reactions to the flower, and her garden.

Esther. I'm thinking of the morning glory. They last a day - and then pinks. Something like that would affect her as well. They're beautiful little things, but they don't stay around very long.

Greg. I think that the fact that we see the term "little Maid" coming up over and over again in poems about flowers is also a clue. It seems a funny way to write about a young woman - o call her a "little Maid,". when she's dying.

Margaret. I think it's Dickinsons double entendre - she's doing it all the time. She's playing on both levels. I don't think you can say it's maid person, or that it's a flower. It's both.

Greg. What do you think inspired the poem?

Margaret. I think it was inspired by death but I've already said that.

Lynn. I was hoping it would be inspired by a night-blooming flower.

Greg. Yeah, we talked about this poem in the other group, that meets at the Jones Library. There are a couple of gardeners in that group - Victoria Dickson - and that was her thought, too - a night-blooming flower. I didn't even know there were such things. The next poem is one of Victoria's favorites.

Mary Clare reads:
Bloom — is Result — to meet a Flower
And casually glance
Would scarcely cause one to suspect
The minor Circumstance

Assisting in the Bright Affair
So intricately done
Then offered as a Butterfly
To the Meridian —

To pack the Bud — oppose the Worm —
Obtain its right of Dew —
Adjust the Heat — elude the Wind —
Escape the prowling Bee

Great Nature not to disappoint
Awaiting Her that Day —
To be a Flower, is profound
Responsibility —
                        - J1058/Fr1038/M469

I understand that you might not notice, just glancing at it, what a miracle it is, but I don't understand the Meridian thing.

Greg. It's noon; the high point of the day.

Lynn. And, does pack the Bud mean just the way the bud is so tightly curled in?

Alice. - if you had to do it yourself.

Margaret. It's giving agency to the flower, which I find really interesting.

Barre. I just love that Obtain its right of Dew.

Margaret. It has to work. A flower has to work - in order to be a flower, right? It doesn't just happen.

Lynn. But why Escape the prowling Bee? It should welcome the bee.

Greg. Judith Farr may have an explanation for that. There are some flowers, when the bee goes at it, it goes between the sepal and the petal and, she says, it will actually damage some of the membrane of the flower when it does that. So, maybe she's alluding to that.

Barre. What about that Butterfly?

Alice. Compare a butterfly to noon. Here's a tiny thing that just lives a short instance, and noon is

Leslie, "Like," in stead of as,

Margaret. It follows from the line, doesn't it. And there's a variant here: "Would cause one scarcely to suspect" in stead of Would scarcely cause one to suspect.

Greg. It sounds a little bit like the "penurious smile" where the flower might not receive it's just recognition.

Margaret. We should put little plaques along the Bridge of Flowers, shouldn't we? "Are you really looking at what this flower is doing? [laughter]

Wendy. I just have to say, some of the language in here just knocks me out. I love Bloom - is Result. There's something that sets it up as a dry, logical kick-off, and then it goes in a completely different direction; I love that. And then go back to profound Responsibility. And this beautiful creature doesn't need to know that this bee is a [inaudible], right?

Margaret. And this is a prowling Bee, this isn't - you're probably right, Greg.

Greg. It's not the sexual metaphor we were talking about earlier.

[Interlude]

Greg reads.
There is a flower that Bees prefer —
And Butterflies — desire —
To gain the Purple Democrat
The Humming Bird — aspire —

And Whatsoever Insect pass —
A Honey bear away
Proportioned to his several dearth
And her — capacity —

Her face be rounder than the Moon
And ruddier than the Gown
Of Orchis in the Pasture —
Or Rhododendron — worn —

She doth not wait for June —
Before the World be Green —
Her sturdy little Countenance
Against the Wind — be seen —

Contending with the Grass —
Near Kinsman to Herself —
For Privilege of Sod and Sun —
Sweet Litigants for Life —

And when the Hills be full —
And newer fashions blow —
Doth not retract a single spice
For pang of jealousy —

Her Public — be the Noon —
Her Providence — the Sun —
Her Progress — by the Bee — proclaimed —
In sovereign — Swerveless Tune —

The Bravest — of the Host —
Surrendering — the last —
Nor even of Defeat — aware —
What cancelled by the Frost —
                        -J380/Fr624/M324

Lynn. Oh, this is like one of those puzzles - riddles.

Margaret. I know what this is [ soft laugh ]

Sandy. the Purple Democrat.

Margaret. Yep. That's the clue.

Greg. It lasts the whole season. It's sturdy.

Lynn. It's Purple

.

Margaret. It's interesting - the choice of the word Purple. Purple is almost an oxymoron with Democrat, because purple is the color of Royalty.

Greg. Before the World be Green.

Margaret. Her sturdy little Countenance, That's another clue.

Lynn. Clover? [ general applause ]

Greg. The Contending with the Grass verse is so Darwinian. I mean, this clover is fighting for survival here. And there's the face and Countenance again.

Lynn. the purple doesn't make much sense to me.

Margaret. It's a reddish purple, but the choice of the word purple would be [crosstalk]

Wendy. Are all the flowers female?

Greg. Well that's the equation we've been following, with flowers to females, and females to flowers, and flowers to poems.

Margaret. Because, the bee is always male, right? The queen bee is always in her hive; she never goes out working.

Greg. I think there are poems where it's not stated, like "The Dandelion's pallid tube."

Margaret. How about sovereign Swerveless Tune?

Greg. Isn' t that pretty? That's really nice.

Esther. And there's that word Countenance again. If you're going to, do all the poems with "countenance" in them. [ There are 21 ]

Greg. It's another anthropomorhization of the flowers; they have faces - countenances.

Connie. And the flower poems, so far don't seem to have that little twist at the end, as so many of the other poems do.

Greg. What about the penurious Smile?

Connie. Well that's the one that came closest.

Lynn. This poem seems allot more accessible than some of the others. [ general agreement ]

Greg. How about the word several in the second stanza? - several dearth - his individual dearth.

Margaret. It's very interesting, her choice of words in this poem.

Lynn. So, the honey they bear - according to their capacity?

Margaret. Think of how much honey an ant can bear.

Greg. Is an Orchis a kind of orchid? If so, I'm surprised to find it in a Pasture.

Several. Oh yes, there are many varieties of wild orchid.

Margaret. Orchis is this botanical name.

Greg. This next one could probably have gone at the beginning.

Lynn reads:

Flowers—Well—if anybody

Can the ecstasy define—

Half a transport—half a trouble—

With which flowers humble men:

Anybody find the fountain

From which floods so contra flow—

I will give him all the Daisies

Which upon the hillside blow.

Too much pathos in their faces

For a simple breast like mine—

Butterflies from St. Domingo

Cruising round the purple line—

Have a system of aesthetics—

Far superior to mine.

                        - J137/Fr95/M62

Sandy. At this time in the nineteenth century, there was almost a mania for collecting exotic flowers.

Greg. Yes, I read that the zinnia came to this country from Mexico, and was considered very exotic.

Barre. The word transport - does it mean that I'm transported by this experience - it's so wonderful?

Greg. Carried Away!

Margaret. Half a transport—half a trouble.

Greg. Could it be that sometimes beauty can be so intense that it hurts, almost? It pulls you out of yourself, almost.

Wendy. What is Cruising round the purple line? Is that the equator or something?

Margaret. It could be butterflies cruising in the summer air.

Alice. That's the horizon, I think.

Leslie reads.
The Lilac is an ancient shrub
But ancienter than that
The Firmamental Lilac
Upon the Hill tonight —
The Sun subsiding on his Course
Bequeaths this final Plant
To Contemplation — not to Touch —
The Flower of Occident.

Of one Corolla is the West —
The Calyx is the Earth —
The Capsules burnished Seeds the Stars
The Scientist of Faith
His research has but just begun —
Above his synthesis
The Flora unimpeachable
To Time's Analysis —
"Eye hath not seen" may possibly
Be current with the Blind
But let not Revelation
By theses be detained —
                        - 1241/Fr1261/M562

Greg. There's something to chew on. I picked it because of all the botanical terms; it shows how she's mastered those terms.

Leslie.  In the first stanza, we're looking at this larger, more holy-than-life Lilac on the hill as the sun goes down, right? It's a firmamental Lilac, so it's in the sky, right?

Barre. Is it a sunset? [general agreement]

Margaret. The first three lines of the second stanza are just drawing the whole universe around the sunset.

Esther. And the whole universe, and the sunset, are like a flower.

Barre. Is The Scientist of Faith like an oxymoron? How can a scientist believe in -

Margaret. No!

Alice. What does a scientist do?

Margaret. He studies.

Barre. That which cannot be studied by science, but only by faith. [crosstalk]

Margaret. You've heard of the philosophy of science; well, there's also the science of philosophy.

Greg. Edward Hitchcock, probably the leading intellectual force in Amherst and surrounding areas at the time, published, among other books, one entitled "The Religion of Geology." He studied geology with an eye toward reading God's divine intent in everything he saw. When I read this, I think of that.

Margaret. That's Puritan Typology. They really did believe that everything in nature was a microcosm of the divine, so that the spider's web has an actual, particular meaning.

Greg. And, the butterfly emerging from the chrysalis is God's symbol of the resurrection, for us to contemplate.

Wendy. So, getting back to this, she does carry on this scientific notion - I'm not following it, or understanding it particularly, but, getting down to let not Revelation/ By theses be detained­ - So, something about - whatever hypothesis you might have about existence, or nature, let's not be pinned down, in the way we see things. ... and what does Eye hath not seen refer to?

Greg. It's from First Corinthians. “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him” (1 Cor. 2:9) There's no single source more frequently alluded to in her poems, or her letters, than the King James version. It's everywhere.