FATE slew him, but he did not drop;
She felled—he did not fall—
Impaled him on her fiercest stakes—
He neutralized them all.She stung him, sapped his firm advance,
~Emily Dickinson
But, when her worst was done,
And he, unmoved, regarded her,
Acknowledged him a man.
Happy Monday! If ever there was a poetic battle cry for a Monday morning, this is it. May you not drop, not fall, and neutralize all Fate’s fiercest stakes. Let’s do this!
THIS merit hath the worst,—
It cannot be again.
When Fate hath taunted last
And thrown her furthest stone,The maimed may pause and breathe, And glance securely round.
~Emily Dickinson
The deer invites no longer
Than it eludes the hound.
This one is eluding me right now. I *think* she’s saying that when you’ve experienced the worst, then you get a respite. I am really not sure. The combination of 6:30am and a weekend of two kid slumber parties is not helping me out.
I chose this one for the deer and the hound–a break from ghosts and wandering spirits. Hunting season has just begun here in the rural South. In one way or another, a lot of folks have deer on the brain.
We don’t hunt, though we have a lot of friends and family who do. Our closest approximation to hunting is checking the trail cam we keep in the woods behind our house. Usually there are several pictures of deer, perhaps a raccoon or two, and a bunch of random tree pictures probably triggered by the wind in the branches or the flight of a passing bird.
Last night, though, we checked the latest set of images and found three pictures of bear cubs. We geeked out pretty hard over these. Baby bears are stinking adorable. Their noses and heads are out of all proportion to their little bodies.
It was magical to see them, to know that these huge creatures are moving along the paths we walk daily. However, I now have cause to fear a different kind of hunting. I think it’s time to go batten down the beehives……
I know that He exists.
–Emily Dickinson
Somewhere – in silence –
He has hid his rare life
From our gross eyes.
’Tis an instant’s play –
’Tis a fond Ambush –
Just to make Bliss
Earn her own surprise!
But – should the play
Prove piercing earnest –
Should the glee – glaze –
In Death’s – stiff – stare –
Would not the fun
Look too expensive!
Would not the jest –
Have crawled too far!
It’s not just the mention of silence in the first stanza but also the continued metaphor of play and contrast between bliss and pain that calls to mind Robert Browning’s Tempest-inspired “Caliban upon Setebos.” In Browning’s poem Caliban, the monster enslaved by Prospero, muses on his understanding of the divine. It’s a fantastic poem–read it here, and see what you think.
The Emily Project 