Recently I’ve published some posts about Millicent Todd Bianchi’s 1945 edition of previously unpublished poems by Dickinson, “Bolts of Melody.” One post a couple of days ago mentioned a section in the back of the book entitled “Poems Incomplete or Unfinished," HERE.
I’ve selected two of these poems at random, and I’ll highlight one today, “The fairest home I ever knew,” and one tomorrow, “My reward for being was this.”
The first poem appears in “Bolts of Melody” like this:
The fairest home I ever knew
Was founded in an hour
By parties also that I knew,
A spider and a flower.
A manse of mechlin and of floss
* * * *
For some reason, Bianchi includes a stanza break after line 4, and then the four asterisks after line 5 to imply that additional lines were lost or never written. However, the handwritten draft by Dickinson doesn’t seem to include or even suggest a line break.
I’ve selected two of these poems at random, and I’ll highlight one today, “The fairest home I ever knew,” and one tomorrow, “My reward for being was this.”
The first poem appears in “Bolts of Melody” like this:
The fairest home I ever knew
Was founded in an hour
By parties also that I knew,
A spider and a flower.
A manse of mechlin and of floss
* * * *
For some reason, Bianchi includes a stanza break after line 4, and then the four asterisks after line 5 to imply that additional lines were lost or never written. However, the handwritten draft by Dickinson doesn’t seem to include or even suggest a line break.
All later editions of Dickinson’s works do not include the break – Johnson, Franklin, and Miller all show this as a five line poem:
The fairest Home I ever knew
Was founded in an Hour
By Parties also that I knew,
A spider and a Flower –
A manse of mechlin and of Floss –
Franklin’s variorum and Miller’s edition also note that Dickinson considered “Gloss” and “sun” in place of the final word, “Floss.”
Franklin also mentioned in his research that the lines are “in pencil on a fragment of stationery addressed by an unidentified hand to ‘Miss Vinnie Dickinson (A 394). On the other side is a draft of part of a letter sent to Sarah Tuckerman about 1877.”
In the draft of the letter, Dickinson wrote, “Accept my timid happiness – no Joy can be in vain but adds to some bright [* sweet] . . . whose dwelling”
I’m not sure what made Bianchi consider this an incomplete poem, but I suspect it was the rhyme scheme. The first four lines follow and ABAB pattern (with lines 1 and 3 ending in the same word, “knew”), so perhaps she thought of the fifth line as the start of a new stanza.
I will add that Dickinson’s writing seems to follow the contour of the page; nothing appears to be ripped away in her jottings. If that were the case, then it might suggest additional lines have been lost to the ages – but no.
What do you think? Is this a complete work? Or an incomplete poem?
The fairest Home I ever knew
Was founded in an Hour
By Parties also that I knew,
A spider and a Flower –
A manse of mechlin and of Floss –
Franklin’s variorum and Miller’s edition also note that Dickinson considered “Gloss” and “sun” in place of the final word, “Floss.”
Franklin also mentioned in his research that the lines are “in pencil on a fragment of stationery addressed by an unidentified hand to ‘Miss Vinnie Dickinson (A 394). On the other side is a draft of part of a letter sent to Sarah Tuckerman about 1877.”
In the draft of the letter, Dickinson wrote, “Accept my timid happiness – no Joy can be in vain but adds to some bright [* sweet] . . . whose dwelling”
I’m not sure what made Bianchi consider this an incomplete poem, but I suspect it was the rhyme scheme. The first four lines follow and ABAB pattern (with lines 1 and 3 ending in the same word, “knew”), so perhaps she thought of the fifth line as the start of a new stanza.
I will add that Dickinson’s writing seems to follow the contour of the page; nothing appears to be ripped away in her jottings. If that were the case, then it might suggest additional lines have been lost to the ages – but no.
What do you think? Is this a complete work? Or an incomplete poem?
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