Poems by Emily Dickinson, Series One

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.
 
 
The time was scarce profaned by speech;
The symbol of a word
Was needless, as at sacrament
The wardrobe of our Lord.
 
 
Each was to each the sealed church,
Permitted to commune this time,
Lest we too awkward show
At supper of the Lamb.
 
 
The hours slid fast, as hours will,
Clutched tight by greedy hands;
So faces on two decks look back,
Bound to opposing lands.
 
 
And so, when all the time had failed,
Without external sound,
Each bound the other's crucifix,
We gave no other bond.
 
 
Sufficient troth that we shall rise —
Deposed, at length, the grave —
To that new marriage, justified
Through Calvaries of Love!
 

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.
 
 
My second rank, too small the first,
Crowned, crowing on my father's breast,
A half unconscious queen;
But this time, adequate, erect,
With will to choose or to reject.
And I choose – just a throne.
 

XV

RESURRECTION

 
'T 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.
 
 
No lifetime set on them,
Apparelled as the new
Unborn, except they had beheld,
Born everlasting now.
 
 
Was bridal e'er like this?
A paradise, the host,
And cherubim and seraphim
The most familiar guest.
 

XVI

APOCALYPSE

 
I'm wife; I've finished that,
That other state;
I'm Czar, I'm woman now:
It's safer so.
 
 
How odd the girl's life looks
Behind this soft eclipse!
I think that earth seems so
To those in heaven now.
 
 
This being comfort, then
That other kind was pain;
But why compare?
I'm wife! stop there!
 

XVII

THE WIFE

 
She rose to his requirement, dropped
The playthings of her life
To take the honorable work
Of woman and of wife.
 
 
If aught she missed in her new day
Of amplitude, or awe,
Or first prospective, or the gold
In using wore away,
 
 
It lay unmentioned, as the sea
Develops pearl and weed,
But only to himself is known
The fathoms they abide.
 

XVIII

APOTHEOSIS

 
Come slowly, Eden!
Lips unused to thee,
Bashful, sip thy jasmines,
As the fainting bee,
 
 
Reaching late his flower,
Round her chamber hums,
Counts his nectars – enters,
And is lost in balms!
 

III.
NATURE

I

 
New feet within my garden go,
New fingers stir the sod;
A troubadour upon the elm
Betrays the solitude.
 
 
New children play upon the green,
New weary sleep below;
And still the pensive spring returns,
And still the punctual snow!
 

II

MAY-FLOWER

 
Pink, small, and punctual,
Aromatic, low,
Covert in April,
Candid in May,
 
 
Dear to the moss,
Known by the knoll,
Next to the robin
In every human soul.
 
 
Bold little beauty,
Bedecked with thee,
Nature forswears
Antiquity.
 

III

WHY?

 
THE murmur of a bee
A witchcraft yieldeth me.
If any ask me why,
'T were easier to die
Than tell.
 
 
The red upon the hill
Taketh away my will;
If anybody sneer,
Take care, for God is here,
That's all.
 
 
The breaking of the day
Addeth to my degree;
If any ask me how,
Artist, who drew me so,
Must tell!
 

IV

 
Perhaps you'd like to buy a flower?
But I could never sell.
If you would like to borrow
Until the daffodil
 
 
Unties her yellow bonnet
Beneath the village door,
Until the bees, from clover rows
Their hock and sherry draw,
 
 
Why, I will lend until just then,
But not an hour more!
 

V

 
The pedigree of honey
Does not concern the bee;
A clover, any time, to him
Is aristocracy.
 

VI

A SERVICE OF SONG

 
Some keep the Sabbath going to church;
I keep it staying at home,
With a bobolink for a chorister,
And an orchard for a dome.
 
 
Some keep the Sabbath in surplice;
I just wear my wings,
And instead of tolling the bell for church,
Our little sexton sings.
 
 
God preaches, – a noted clergyman, —
And the sermon is never long;
So instead of getting to heaven at last,
I'm going all along!
 

VII

 
The bee is not afraid of me,
I know the butterfly;
The pretty people in the woods
Receive me cordially.
 
 
The brooks laugh louder when I come,
The breezes madder play.
Wherefore, mine eyes, thy silver mists?
Wherefore, O summer's day?
 

VIII

SUMMER'S ARMIES

 
Some rainbow coming from the fair!
Some vision of the world Cashmere
I confidently see!
Or else a peacock's purple train,
Feather by feather, on the plain
Fritters itself away!
 
 
The dreamy butterflies bestir,
Lethargic pools resume the whir
Of last year's sundered tune.
From some old fortress on the sun
Baronial bees march, one by one,
In murmuring platoon!
 
 
The robins stand as thick to-day
As flakes of snow stood yesterday,
On fence and roof and twig.
The orchis binds her feather on
For her old lover, Don the Sun,
Revisiting the bog!
 
 
Without commander, countless, still,
The regiment of wood and hill
In bright detachment stand.
Behold! Whose multitudes are these?
The children of whose turbaned seas,
Or what Circassian land?
 

IX

THE GRASS

 
The grass so little has to do, —
A sphere of simple green,
With only butterflies to brood,
And bees to entertain,
 
 
And stir all day to pretty tunes
The breezes fetch along,
And hold the sunshine in its lap
And bow to everything;
 
 
And thread the dews all night, like pearls,
And make itself so fine, —
A duchess were too common
For such a noticing.
 
 
And even when it dies, to pass
In odors so divine,
As lowly spices gone to sleep,
Or amulets of pine.
 
 
And then to dwell in sovereign barns,
And dream the days away, —
The grass so little has to do,
I wish I were the hay!
 

X

 
A little road not made of man,
Enabled of the eye,
Accessible to thill of bee,
Or cart of butterfly.
 
 
If town it have, beyond itself,
'T is that I cannot say;
I only sigh, – no vehicle
Bears me along that way.
 

XI

SUMMER SHOWER

 
A drop fell on the apple tree,
Another on the roof;
A half a dozen kissed the eaves,
And made the gables laugh.
 
 
A few went out to help the brook,
That went to help the sea.
Myself conjectured, Were they pearls,
What necklaces could be!
 
 
The dust replaced in hoisted roads,
The birds jocoser sung;
The sunshine threw his hat away,
The orchards spangles hung.
 
 
The breezes brought dejected lutes,
And bathed them in the glee;
The East put out a single flag,
And signed the fete away.