Emily Dickinson

My favorite poem is one by Emily Dickinson that begins “I dwell in Possibility-“ and having been given a lovely gilt-edged book calling itself The Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson by my parents many years ago, last year I finally creaked open it’s spine intending to read it cover to cover to find the source of my favorite line. Alas, having (at last) come to the end this winter, I hadn’t found the gem and was beginning to fear that the verse I loved was a mirage, inauthentic, and quickly fading in its glory.

I had found the rest of the verse online but knew it didn’t count unless I saw it on a page in a book with Emily’s name by it. As I searched the shelves of Magers & Quinn one afternoon in January, I found it in a couple texts, which was a dear relief, but was still curious as to why it wasn’t to be found in my lovely edition. A helpful bookseller answered my query with a most logical response: “collected” isn’t a synonym for “complete.” Ah. Thank you.

Thusly, I am a dope. I printed the poem from the Almighty Internet and taped it to the inside cover of my pretty gilt-edged book, full of my handwriting in the margins:

I dwell in Possibility—

A fairer house than Prose—

More numerous of Windows—

Superior—for Doors—

Of Chambers as the Cedars—

Impregnable of Eye—

And for an Everlasting Roof

The Gambrels of the Sky—

Of Visitors—the fairest—

For Occupation—This—

The spreading wide my narrow Hands

To gather Paradise—

Oh Emily, your love of simple verse is so cumbersome! For so long I’ve wanted to love you! To understand what on Earth you were feeling when you wrote. Mostly, I experience abrupt confusion. What are you talking about?! After months, (years!) of trying, I have resigned myself to allow room for growth and love what I can pick out, what I can glean meaning from. For instance: “There is no frigate like a book/to take us lands away,/Nor any coursers like a page/Of prancing poetry.” I know! I know this feeling.

As I revisit the text I find others, many, that I marked with made-in-Minnesota, 3M-issue flags and bookmarks of all kinds. I feel fondness for many of Emily’s poems, some of the longer ones even. I’m not so dense!

I have no life but this,

To lead it here;

Nor any death, but lest

Dispelled from there;

Nor tie to earths to come,

Nor action new,

Except through this extent,

The realm of you.

Oh dear! The passion! The desire! Did spinster Emily have a Love? Was it her quiet and cursing God? Was she a Protestant nun? Who on Earth is she talking about?

Wild nights! Wild nights!

Were I with thee,

Wild nights should be

Our luxury!

Futile the winds

To a heart in port—

Done with the compass,

Done with the chart.

Rowing in Eden!

Ah! the sea!

Might I but moor

Tonight in thee!

Yikes! She goes on, in praise of Nature, God, Time, & Eternity. We dance around the classics, never getting to know them intimately but rather, acknowledging that they are Classic and therefore Wonderful. I want to know them, want to say: I’ve read that, I get it. Or: Give me a break! It’s not that great. Or: What do you mean you’ve never read it? How can you understand anything at all without knowing the truths from this text?

So I started with Emily because she wrote short poems and they weren’t intimidating but I underestimated the weight of brevity and the depth of bumblebees and God. Perhaps the most important thing to remember about Emily is that her words weren’t meant to be read by others; she wrote as many of us breathe: feverishly, out of need, and with gusto. She existed in her little room in her white gown to leave behind the documentation of her personal musings for the validation of our similar thoughts. Thanks Em.

I will leave you with this active verse, that hearkens a bit to Lewis Carroll:

Could I but ride indefinite,

As doth the meadow-bee,

And visit only where I liked,

And no man visit me,

And flirt all day with buttercups,

And marry whom I may,

And dwell a little everywhere,

Or better, run away

With no police to follow,

Or chase me if I do,

Till I should jump peninsulas

To get away from you,--

I said, but just to be a bee

Upon a raft of air,

And row in nowhere all day long,

And anchor off the bar,--

What liberty! So captives deem

Who tight in dungeons are.