480

“Why do I love” You, Sir?
Because—
The Wind does not require the Grass
To answer—Wherefore when He pass
She cannot keep Her place.

Because He knows—and
Do not You—
And We know not—
Enough for Us
The Wisdom it be so—

The Lightning—never asked an Eye
Wherefore it shut—when He was by—
Because He knows it cannot speak—
And reasons not contained—
—Of Talk—
There be—preferred by Daintier Folk—

The Sunrise—Sire—compelleth Me—
Because He’s Sunrise—and I see—
Therefore—Then—
I love Thee—

1680

Sometimes with the Heart
Seldom with the Soul
Scarcer once with the Might
Few—love at all.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XLVI

HE fumbles at your spirit
  As players at the keys
Before they drop full music on;
  He stuns you by degrees,
  
Prepares your brittle substance         
  For the ethereal blow,
By fainter hammers, further heard,
  Then nearer, then so slow
  
Your breath has time to straighten,
  Your brain to bubble cool,—         
Deals one imperial thunderbolt
  That scalps your naked soul.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XLVII

HEART, we will forget him!
  You and I, to-night!
You may forget the warmth he gave,
  I will forget the light.
  
When you have done, pray tell me,         
  That I my thoughts may dim;
Haste! lest while you’re lagging,
  I may remember him!

I ENVY seas whereon he rides,
  I envy spokes of wheels
Of chariots that him convey,
  I envy speechless hills
  
That gaze upon his journey;       
  How easy all can see
What is forbidden utterly
  As heaven, unto me!
  
I envy nests of sparrows
  That dot his distant eaves,         
The wealthy fly upon his pane,
  The happy, happy leaves
  
That just abroad his window
  Have summer’s leave to be,
The earrings of Pizarro         
  Could not obtain for me.
  
I envy light that wakes him,
  And bells that boldly ring
To tell him it is noon abroad,—
  Myself his noon could bring,         
  
Yet interdict my blossom
  And abrogate my bee,
Lest noon in everlasting night
  Drop Gabriel and me.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

VI

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 *****,
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.
  
If certain, when this life was out,
That yours and mine should be,
I ’d toss it yonder like a rind,         
And taste eternity.
  
But now, all ignorant of the length
Of time’s uncertain wing,
It goads me, like the goblin bee,
That will not state its sting.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XXXVI

MY worthiness is all my doubt,
  His merit all my fear,
Contrasting which, my qualities
  Do lowlier appear;
  
Lest I should insufficient prove         
  For his beloved need,
The chiefest apprehension
  Within my loving creed.
  
So I, the undivine abode
  Of his elect content,       
Conform my soul as ’t were a church
  Unto her sacrament.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XXIX

THE ROSE did caper on her cheek,
Her bodice rose and fell,
Her pretty speech, like drunken men,
Did stagger pitiful.
  
Her fingers fumbled at her work,—       
Her needle would not go;
What ailed so smart a little maid
It puzzled me to know,
  
Till opposite I spied a cheek
That bore another rose;         
Just opposite, another speech
That like the drunkard goes;
  
A vest that, like the bodice, danced
To the immortal tune,—
Till those two troubled little clocks         
Ticked softly into one.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

II

YOU left me, sweet, two legacies,—
A legacy of love
A Heavenly Father would content,
Had He the offer of;
  
You left me boundaries of pain         
Capacious as the sea,
Between eternity and time,
Your consciousness and me.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XIII

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 sail 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!

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XXXV

PROUD of my broken heart since thou didst break it,
  Proud of the pain I did not feel till thee,
Proud of my night since thou with moons dost slake it,
  Not to partake thy passion, my humility.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XLII

TO lose thee, sweeter than to gain
  All other hearts I knew.
’T is true the drought is destitute,
  But then I had the dew!
  
The Caspian has its realms of sand,         
  Its other realm of sea;
Without the sterile perquisite
  No Caspian could be.

Emily Dickinson (1830–86).  Complete Poems.  1924.

Part Three: Love

XLV

I ’VE got an arrow here;
  Loving the hand that sent it,
I the dart revere.
  
Fell, they will say, in “skirmish”!
  Vanquished, my soul will know,         
By but a simple arrow
  Sped by an archer’s bow.