Month: February 2025

What care the Dead, for Chanticleer —
What care the Dead for Day?
‘Tis late your Sunrise vex their face —
And Purple Ribaldry — of Morning

Pour as blank on them
As on the Tier of Wall
The Mason builded, yesterday,
And equally as cool —

What care the Dead for Summer?
The Solstice had no Sun
Could waste the Snow before their Gate —
And knew One Bird a Tune —

Could thrill their Mortised Ear
Of all the Birds that be —
This One — beloved of Mankind
Henceforward cherished be —

What care the Dead for Winter?
Themselves as easy freeze —
June Noon — as January Night —
As soon the South — her Breeze

Of Sycamore — or Cinnamon —
Deposit in a Stone
And put a Stone to keep it Warm —
Give Spices — unto Men —

With this poem, ‘What care I for the dead’ (F624), ED hints at an answer to my implied question of the previous poem, “I wonder whether ED ever reached that entirely reasonable, anxiety-relieving, and simply stated belief: there is no there there.” The answer leans yes, at least for this poem, F624.

Prayer is the little implement
Through which Men reach
Where Presence — is denied them –
They fling their Speech

By means of it — in God’s Ear —
If then He hear —
This sums the Apparatus
Comprised in Prayer —

As ED poem succeeds ED poem, it feels she moves gradually from “God the loving Father” to “God the Watchmaker” to “God the Unconcerned” to “God the Deaf, Dumb, and Blind” to “God the Human Invention”. That final nihilistic tenet leaves us expecting nothing, nada, nichts after death. I wonder whether ED ever reached that entirely reasonable, anxiety-relieving, and simply stated belief: there is no there there.

ED, you are a courageous miracle.

To interrupt His Yellow Plan
The Sun does not allow
Caprices of the Atmosphere —
And even when the Snow

Heaves Balls of Specks, like Vicious Boy
Directly in His Eye —
Does not so much as turn His Head
Busy with Majesty —

‘Tis His to stimulate the Earth —
And magnetize the Sea —
And bind Astronomy, in place,
Yet Any passing by

Would deem Ourselves — the busier
As the minutest Bee
That rides — emits a Thunder —
A Bomb — to justify —

” ‘Tis His to stimulate the Earth —”: Sun’s cycles spur spring flowers, ripen summer hay, paint autumn red, shape winter snow.

“And magnetize the Sea —”: Sun’s pull tugs oceans into tides.

“And bind Astronomy, in place”: Sun’s gravity binds planets in their place.

Ancient Egyptians had it right: Ra deserves worship above all other gods. He gives us life and asks nothing in return. He will die, but Homo (un)sapiens will be gone and forgotten. Did ED sense these truths in 1863 when she wrote this poem?

The Wind — tapped like a tired Man —
And like a Host — “Come in”
I boldly answered — entered then
My Residence within

A Rapid — footless Guest —
To offer whom a Chair
Were as impossible as hand
A Sofa to the Air —

No Bone had He to bind Him —
His Speech was like the Push
Of numerous Humming Birds at once
From a superior Bush —

His Countenance — a Billow —
His Fingers, as He passed
Let go a music — as of tunes
Blown tremulous in Glass —

He visited — still flitting —
Then like a timid Man
Again, He tapped — ’twas flurriedly —
And I became alone —

Is the “Wind” an allegory for something else? Some contenders:

1. The wind is simply the wind.

2. A Ruby-throated Hummingbird.

3. Physical existence:

“So this life of man appears for a short space, but of what went before, or what is to follow, we are utterly ignorant” (Bede, 731 AD)

4.Spiritual existence:

“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more.” (Macbeth, 1606)

5. Charles Wadsworth: Wadsworth blew into her life in March 1855 and out in May 1862, “And I became alone —”.

6. And the winner is: All of the above and many more.

If any sink, assure that this, now standing —
Failed like Themselves — and conscious that it rose —
Grew by the Fact, and not the Understanding
How Weakness passed — or Force — arose —

Tell that the Worst, is easy in a Moment –
Dread, but the Whizzing, before the Ball –
When the Ball enters, enters Silence –
Dying – annuls the power to kill –

An interpretation, sans corpse. Death of a Love, on May1, 1862:

If you fail and sink, be assured that I, now standing –
Failed like you – and, conscious that I rose –
Grew brave in heart, without understanding
How weakness passed – or Strength – returned –

Know that the Pain is bearable if Dread is brief –
Like the whizzing of the Ball before it strikes.
When it Strikes, Silence reigns –
Dying, in heart or head, annuls your will to kill.

‘Twas warm — at first — like Us —
Until there crept upon
A Chill — like frost upon a Glass —
Till all the scene — be gone.

The Forehead copied stone —
The Fingers grew too cold
To ache — and like a Skater’s Brook —
The busy eyes — congealed —

It straightened — that was all —
It crowded Cold to Cold —
It multiplied indifference —
As Pride were all it could —

And even when with Cords —
‘Twas lowered, like a Weight —
It made no Signal, nor demurred,
But dropped like Adamant.

The vote is in. All published reviewers and TPB commenters on this poem agree on the obvious, it is about a corpse. But before we close the coffin, I’d like to take a second look for a metaphor level. As a mature poet, ED’s poems typically have two or more levels. If this death poem has only one, the literal one, it would be an unusual ED poem.

My guess is that ‘Twas warm — at first — like Us —’ (F614, 1863) is a metaphor describing the death a love relationship that ED thought would last for the rest of her life and then eternally in Heaven. The funeral was May 1, 1862, when Reverend Charles Wadsworth boarded a ship in New York Harbor and set sail to San Francisco. She had to be extremely circumspect in this poem because its metaphor meaning could ruin the lives of both Wadsworth and her.

∙See the explication of the previous poem, F613, ‘The Day that I was crowned’, on this blog, ‘ED-LarryB’.