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Эмили Дикинсон
Poems by Emily Dickinson, Third Series

XLV.
THE PAST

 
The past is such a curious creature,
  To look her in the face
A transport may reward us,
  Or a disgrace.
 
 
Unarmed if any meet her,
  I charge him, fly!
Her rusty ammunition
  Might yet reply!
 

XLVI

 
To help our bleaker parts
  Salubrious hours are given,
Which if they do not fit for earth
  Drill silently for heaven.
 

XLVII

 
What soft, cherubic creatures
  These gentlewomen are!
One would as soon assault a plush
  Or violate a star.
 
 
Such dimity convictions,
  A horror so refined
Of freckled human nature,
  Of Deity ashamed, —
 
 
It's such a common glory,
  A fisherman's degree!
Redemption, brittle lady,
  Be so, ashamed of thee.
 

XLVIII.
DESIRE

 
Who never wanted, – maddest joy
  Remains to him unknown:
The banquet of abstemiousness
  Surpasses that of wine.
 
 
Within its hope, though yet ungrasped
  Desire's perfect goal,
No nearer, lest reality
  Should disenthrall thy soul.
 

XLIX.
PHILOSOPHY

 
It might be easier
  To fail with land in sight,
Than gain my blue peninsula
  To perish of delight.
 

L.
POWER

 
You cannot put a fire out;
  A thing that can ignite
Can go, itself, without a fan
  Upon the slowest night.
 
 
You cannot fold a flood
  And put it in a drawer, —
Because the winds would find it out,
  And tell your cedar floor.
 

LI

 
A modest lot, a fame petite,
  A brief campaign of sting and sweet
  Is plenty! Is enough!
A sailor's business is the shore,
  A soldier's – balls. Who asketh more
Must seek the neighboring life!
 

LII

 
Is bliss, then, such abyss
I must not put my foot amiss
For fear I spoil my shoe?
 
 
I'd rather suit my foot
Than save my boot,
For yet to buy another pair
Is possible
At any fair.
 
 
But bliss is sold just once;
The patent lost
None buy it any more.
 

LIII.
EXPERIENCE

 
I stepped from plank to plank
  So slow and cautiously;
The stars about my head I felt,
  About my feet the sea.
 
 
I knew not but the next
  Would be my final inch, —
This gave me that precarious gait
  Some call experience.
 

LIV.
THANKSGIVING DAY

 
One day is there of the series
  Termed Thanksgiving day,
Celebrated part at table,
  Part in memory.
 
 
Neither patriarch nor pussy,
  I dissect the play;
Seems it, to my hooded thinking,
  Reflex holiday.
 
 
Had there been no sharp subtraction
  From the early sum,
Not an acre or a caption
  Where was once a room,
 
 
Not a mention, whose small pebble
  Wrinkled any bay, —
Unto such, were such assembly,
  'T were Thanksgiving day.
 

LV.
CHILDISH GRIEFS

 
Softened by Time's consummate plush,
  How sleek the woe appears
That threatened childhood's citadel
  And undermined the years!
 
 
Bisected now by bleaker griefs,
  We envy the despair
That devastated childhood's realm,
  So easy to repair.
 

II. LOVE

I.
CONSECRATION

 
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.
 

II.
LOVE'S HUMILITY

 
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.
 

III.
LOVE

 
Love is anterior to life,
  Posterior to death,
Initial of creation, and
  The exponent of breath.
 

IV.
SATISFIED

 
One blessing had I, than the rest
  So larger to my eyes
That I stopped gauging, satisfied,
  For this enchanted size.
 
 
It was the limit of my dream,
  The focus of my prayer, —
A perfect, paralyzing bliss
  Contented as despair.
 
 
I knew no more of want or cold,
  Phantasms both become,
For this new value in the soul,
  Supremest earthly sum.
 
 
The heaven below the heaven above
  Obscured with ruddier hue.
Life's latitude leant over-full;
  The judgment perished, too.
 
 
Why joys so scantily disburse,
  Why Paradise defer,
Why floods are served to us in bowls, —
  I speculate no more.
 

V.
WITH A FLOWER

 
When roses cease to bloom, dear,
  And violets are done,
When bumble-bees in solemn flight
  Have passed beyond the sun,
 
 
The hand that paused to gather
  Upon this summer's day
Will idle lie, in Auburn, —
  Then take my flower, pray!
 

VI.
SONG

 
Summer for thee grant I may be
  When summer days are flown!
Thy music still when whippoorwill
  And oriole are done!
 
 
For thee to bloom, I'll skip the tomb
  And sow my blossoms o'er!
Pray gather me, Anemone,
  Thy flower forevermore!
 

VII.
LOYALTY

 
Split the lark and you'll find the music,
  Bulb after bulb, in silver rolled,
Scantily dealt to the summer morning,
  Saved for your ear when lutes be old.
 
 
Loose the flood, you shall find it patent,
  Gush after gush, reserved for you;
Scarlet experiment! sceptic Thomas,
  Now, do you doubt that your bird was true?
 

VIII

 
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.
 

IX

 
  Poor little heart!
  Did they forget thee?
Then dinna care! Then dinna care!
 
 
  Proud little heart!
  Did they forsake thee?
Be debonair! Be debonair!
 
 
  Frail little heart!
  I would not break thee:
Could'st credit me? Could'st credit me?
 
 
  Gay little heart!
  Like morning glory
Thou'll wilted be; thou'll wilted be!
 

X.
FORGOTTEN

 
There is a word
  Which bears a sword
  Can pierce an armed man.
It hurls its barbed syllables,—
  At once is mute again.
But where it fell
The saved will tell
  On patriotic day,
Some epauletted brother
  Gave his breath away.
 
 
Wherever runs the breathless sun,
  Wherever roams the day,
There is its noiseless onset,
  There is its victory!
 
 
Behold the keenest marksman!
  The most accomplished shot!
Time's sublimest target
  Is a soul 'forgot'!
 

XI

 
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.
 

XII.
THE MASTER

 
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.
 

XIII

 
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!
 

XIV

 
Father, I bring thee not myself, —
  That were the little load;
I bring thee the imperial heart
  I had not strength to hold.
 
 
The heart I cherished in my own
  Till mine too heavy grew,
Yet strangest, heavier since it went,
  Is it too large for you?
 

XV

 
We outgrow love like other things
  And put it in the drawer,
Till it an antique fashion shows
  Like costumes grandsires wore.
 

XVI

 
Not with a club the heart is broken,
    Nor with a stone;
A whip, so small you could not see it.
    I've known
 
 
To lash the magic creature
    Till it fell,
Yet that whip's name too noble
    Then to tell.
 
 
Magnanimous of bird
    By boy descried,
To sing unto the stone
    Of which it died.