Poems of Emily Dickinson, series 1 | Page 6

upon the bay.
XXV.
Belshazzar had a letter, --?He never had but one;?Belshazzar's correspondent?Concluded and begun?In that immortal copy?The conscience of us all?Can read without its glasses?On revelation's wall.
XXVI.
The brain within its groove?Runs evenly and true;?But let a splinter swerve,?'T were easier for you?To put the water back?When floods have slit the hills,?And scooped a turnpike for themselves,?And blotted out the mills!
II.
LOVE.
I.
MINE.
Mine by the right of the white election!?Mine by the royal seal!?Mine by the sign in the scarlet prison?Bars cannot conceal!
Mine, here in vision and in veto!?Mine, by the grave's repeal?Titled, confirmed, -- delirious charter!?Mine, while the ages steal!
II.
BEQUEST.
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.
III.
Alter? When the hills do.?Falter? When the sun?Question if his glory?Be the perfect one.
Surfeit? When the daffodil?Doth of the dew:?Even as herself, O friend!?I will of you!
IV.
SUSPENSE.
Elysium is as far as to?The very nearest room,?If in that room a friend await?Felicity or doom.
What fortitude the soul contains,?That it can so endure?The accent of a coming foot,?The opening of a door!
V.
SURRENDER.
Doubt me, my dim companion!?Why, God would be content?With but a fraction of the love?Poured thee without a stint.?The whole of me, forever,?What more the woman can, --?Say quick, that I may dower thee?With last delight I own!
It cannot be my spirit,?For that was thine before;?I ceded all of dust I knew, --?What opulence the more?Had I, a humble maiden,?Whose farthest of degree?Was that she might,?Some distant heaven,?Dwell timidly with thee!
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 balls,?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.
VII.
WITH A FLOWER.
I hide myself within my flower,?That wearing on your breast,?You, unsuspecting, wear me too --?And angels know the rest.
I hide myself within my flower,?That, fading from your vase,?You, unsuspecting, feel for me?Almost a loneliness.
VIII.
PROOF.
That I did always love,?I bring thee proof:?That till I loved?I did not love enough.
That I shall love alway,?I offer thee?That love is life,?And life hath immortality.
This, dost thou doubt, sweet??Then have I?Nothing to show?But Calvary.
IX.
Have you got a brook in your little heart,?Where bashful flowers blow,?And blushing birds go down to drink,?And shadows tremble so?
And nobody knows, so still it flows,?That any brook is there;?And yet your little draught of life?Is daily drunken there.
Then look out for the little brook in March,?When the rivers overflow,?And the snows come hurrying from the hills,?And the bridges often go.
And later, in August it may be,?When the meadows parching lie,?Beware, lest this little brook of life?Some burning noon go dry!
X.
TRANSPLANTED.
As if some little Arctic flower,?Upon the polar hem,?Went wandering down the latitudes,?Until it puzzled came?To continents of summer,?To firmaments of sun,?To strange, bright crowds of flowers,?And birds of foreign tongue!?I say, as if this little flower?To Eden wandered in --?What then? Why, nothing, only,?Your inference therefrom!
XI.
THE OUTLET.
My river runs to thee:?Blue sea, wilt welcome me?
My river waits reply.?Oh sea, look graciously!
I'll fetch thee brooks?From spotted nooks, --
Say, sea,?Take me!
XII.
IN VAIN.
I CANNOT live with you,?It would be life,?And life is over there?Behind the shelf
The sexton keeps the key to,?Putting up?Our life, his porcelain,?Like a cup
Discarded of the housewife,?Quaint or broken;?A newer Sevres pleases,?Old ones crack.
I could not die with you,?For one must wait?To shut the other's gaze down, --?You could not.
And I, could I stand by?And see you freeze,?Without my right of frost,?Death's privilege?
Nor could I rise with you,?Because your face?Would put out Jesus',?That new grace
Glow plain and foreign?On my homesick eye,?Except that you, than he?Shone closer by.
They'd judge us -- how??For you served Heaven, you know,?Or sought to;?I could not,
Because you saturated sight,?And I had no more eyes?For sordid excellence?As Paradise.
And were you lost, I would be,?Though my name?Rang loudest?On the heavenly fame.
And were you saved,?And I condemned to be?Where you were not,?That self were hell to me.
So we must keep apart,?You there, I here,?With just the door ajar?That oceans are,?And prayer,?And that pale sustenance,?Despair!
XIII.
RENUNCIATION.
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 soul 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