Yesterday I posted the poem “She lay as if in play" (HERE), and I listed the first lines of other poems by Dickinson focused on the mourning over the death of a girl.
| I also mentioned that the first line of the poem, “She lay as if in play,” called to mind another of Dickinson’s poem, “She died at play.” However, this poem doesn’t seem to fit the same pattern as those I mentioned yesterday. Instead, it seems to suggest something other than a young girl. Would a beloved child gambol away “Her lease of spotted hours” – and then sink “gaily as a Turk / Opon a Couch of flowers”? No, this poem is a riddle sent as a letter to Dickinson’s sister-in-law Susan Dickinson in the spring of 1860, and it describes the sun as it sank behind the hills. The letter can be found HERE. |  |
Thomas Johnson noted the following about this poem in Dickinson’s handwriting: “the ‘Y’ in ‘Away’ is scrawled so boldly that it goes down between 'of’ and ‘spotted’ in the following line. This copy to Sue is a single stanza, as were so many of those sent directly to her, perhaps indicating her preference, that they are in process of composition, or that Dickinson is experimenting with stanzaic forms.”
 | Hmm…to me, though, it doesn’t quite look like a single stanza. It looks like two stanzas. What do you think? Also, on the back of this page (though there was no picture of it on the archive), Dickinson scrawled an “X” and a triangle – and, according to Johnson, “a list, five lines long: ‘Remember Mister / Austins hold / [illegible] Waltzes - LABITAX / Bobolink Polka / Remember (?).’" “LABITAX”? I wonder what in the world that could mean? LOL If you have any idea, let me know! ; ) |
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