784.1863. I sometimes drop it, for a Quick

784.1863.I sometimes drop it, for a Quick –

I sometimes drop it, for a Quick –
The Thought to be alive –
Anonymous Delight to know –
And Madder – to conceive –

Consoles a Wo so monstrous
That did it tear all Day,
Without an instant’s Respite –
‘Twould look too far – to Die –

Delirium – diverts the Wretch
For Whom the Scaffold neighs –
The Hammock’s motion lulls the Heads
So close on Paradise –

A Reef – crawled easy from the Sea
Eats off the Brittle Line –
The Sailor doesn’t know the Stroke –
Until He’s past the Pain –

“Delirium – diverts the Wretch / For Whom the Scaffold neighs –”:

Occam’s Razor suggests “neighs –” is simply ED’s notorious misspelling of “nighs”.

ED’s father championed building “Insane Asylums”, a euphemism for “Mad House”, as they were then termed. Good thing he didn’t see ED’s poem, which we might dub ‘Mulling Suicide’.

An interpretation of ‘I sometimes drop it, for a Quick –’:

ED offers no alternate words. Parenthesized words are definitions from ED Lexicon; square brackets are my edits.

I sometimes drop [mulling suicide], for a Quick [respite from Wo] –
The Thought to be alive –
(Unknown) Delight to know –
And (Insaner)– to conceive –

[“The Thought to be alive”] (Relieves) a Wo so monstrous
That did it (weep) all Day
Without an instant’s Respite –
[Death would look too far – to wait – ]

(Insanity) – diverts the Wretch
For Whom the Scaffold neighs [nighs]
The Hammock’s motion lulls the Heads
So close on Paradise –

(Adversity) – crawled easy from the Sea
Eats off the (Feeble Cable) –
The Sailor doesn’t know the (End) –
Until He’s past the Pain –

I think the postcendant of “It” (Line 1) is “Plated Wares” (Line 7), a metaphor for “anything you once fell for” but no longer revere (Adam DeGraff, AKA, d. scribe). “It” may be ED’s adolescent romantic infatuation (at age 25-32) with Rev. Charles Wadsworth, which I think is the seed of this poem, or the unfinished quality of the poem itself, which ED apparently realized in 1880.

There is a reason ED would juxtapose in Fascicle 37 this poem, F785 (Poem 13), an initially flawed text but objective truism, with F784 (Poem 12), a painful cry for help, a “Mulling Suicide” poem. It’s inconceivable to me she composed these two poems contemporaneously, despite their consecutive positions and estimated copy date (about late 1863). Perhaps she’s reminding herself of where she’s been sidetracked by infatuation, “Plated Wares”, and where she wants to go, poetic immortality.

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After commenting on Poems 1-763 (Franklin) on The Prowling Bee’, I am convinced that (virtually) all of Emily Dickinson’s (ED’s) poems have a factual historical level in addition to their various poetic levels of meaning. The reason for her instant and continuing public adulation (1890 - present) was and is, by far, poetic. She is one of the "Greats" that she always dreamed to be, despite her lifelong refusal to publish. That refusal freed her from criticism and allowed her to explore the outer boundaries of poetic power.

More than a century of scholarly research has resulted in somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 books and published academic papers about ED. A large majority of these publications focus only on the “poetic levels” of one or more of ED’s poems. Publications that consider both the “historic level” and “poetic levels” comprise a small minority. Publications that focus only on the factual history of her life probably number less than 100. (All numbers in this paragraph are my estimates.)

Unfortunately for ED’s universe of readers, these two basic levels (historical and poetic) cannot be separated into two ivory towers. Every history-level publication that I know of includes at least some discussion of the poetic level(s).

The reverse is not true. In fact, authors of the “poetry-level” school seem to avoid commenting on the historical level, sometimes admonishing that a poem must stand on its own, without concern for its historical roots. To my knowledge, there are (virtually) no published “history-level” books or articles that totally ignore ED’s poems and their poetic levels.

Of course, ED’s refusal to publish her poems was only possible because of lifelong financial and daily social/housekeeping support by her family, especially her father and sister, respectively. In addition, throughout her life, the Dickinsons hired servants, first Negro and later Irish, some of whom became much more than housekeepers for ED.

My point is that our appreciation of ED's poems can be enhanced by understanding both poetic and historical levels of her sound and sense. We impoverish ourselves if we ignore their historical base.