827.1864.All forgot for recollecting

827.1864.All forgot for recollecting

I prefer ED’s original words and phrase (Lines 1, 5, 7, 16), line-by-line:

All forgot for (through) recollecting
Just a paltry One—
All forsook, for just a Stranger’s
New accompanying—
.
Grace of Rank, and Grace of Fortune (Grace of Rank — and — Grace of Fortune)
Less accounted than
An unknown esteem (content) possessing—
Estimate— who can—
.
Home effaced— her faces dwindled—
Nature— altered small—
Sun— if shone— or storm— if shattered—
Overlooked I all—
.
Dropped— my fate— a timid Pebble
In thy bolder Sea—
Ask me —Sweet— if I regret it—
Prove (Ask) myself— of Thee—

“One” (Line 2) is a personal pronoun referring to a person or entity, mortal or immortal. Its capitalization indicates that “One”, whoever “One” is, is important to ED: God, Jesus, Sue, or Reverend Charles Wadsworth. The context of this poem rules out God and Jesus, and Sue is not a stranger . By elimination, “One” is Charles Wadsworth. This understood referent of “One” explains why “Stranger’s” (Line 3) is capitalized: the stranger is Wadsworth.

My interpretation of Fr827, ‘All forgot for recollecting’, verse-by-verse:

I have forgotten all except One: Charles Wadsworth. I have forsaken all my friends. All I think about is Reverend Wadsworth.
.
Grace of rank and fortune is less important than a mysterious esteem Wadsworth possesses. Who knows whence that esteem comes.
.
Home forgotten, familiar faces fade; nature shrinks, sun and storm shrivel. I overlook them all.
‘
I drop my fate, a timid pebble in your bolder sea. Ask me, Sweet, if I regret it, I’ll prove I don’t to Thee.

. . . . . . . . . .

ED Lexicon defines “paltry” as an adjective that means “ragged; shabby; tattered; unkempt; impoverished; mean; of low station; insignificant; unimportant; small; trifling, trite; banal; commonplace; ordinary”. These pejorative adjectives don’t fit Reverend Wadsworth. However, reading Line 2 differently, ED could intend “Just a paltry” to mean “Except just”, which makes sense in the context of Stanza 1 and of the entire poem.

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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.