Yesterday I shared “To my quick ear the Leaves – conferred” (the only poem by Dickinson with the word “cave”), and I closed with this, “I can even see a connection to the advent of human language as the ‘mighty crack’ that made all of humanity visible as we emerged from our caves” (BTW: the day before I focused on the emergence of human language and the first words uttered by cave dwellers in the distant past).
 | Recent posts also focused on onomatopoeic words (a topic related to the development of early language), so for today I explored Dickinson’s use of the word “murmur.” A search for that word on the Dickinson archive yielded 44 entries representing 17 different poems – and lo and behold, I believe I found one of the seventeen, “Many a phrase has the English language,” that seems to be the inverse of the poem I shared yesterday. |
In “To my quick ear the Leaves – conferred,” the speaker is constantly watched by Nature – to the point that she seeks privacy in a cave. On the other hand, in “Many a phrase has the English language,” the speaker is acutely aware of universal truths (i.e., nature?), at least through her lens of English language As matter of fact, the speaker seems to have heard all phrases of the English language – but one.
 | In light of this worldly consciousness, the speaker hopes the “Saxon,” who knows the undisclosed phrase, will whisper it to her – and to her alone. Could that be some statement about …what? What is the meaning of life? Does free will exist? Is there a deeper reality beyond the physical world? What is the nature of the soul? What is the limit of human understanding? Hmm, what could that singular phrase reveal? Now humor me here: The phrase is out there, for it has been uttered – check out the penultimate line: “Say it AGAIN, Saxon” (I added the caps). This reminds me of Ilsa in “Casa Blanca”: “Play it again, Sam,” she whispered. Yes, yes, yes – I know the actual line is “Play it, Sam. Play ‘As Time Goes By,’” and Woody Allen added the “Again” in the movie title, “Play It Again, Sam.” However, now in our collective memory, the line is “Play it again, Sam.” In the movie Ilsa knows the song; she wants to hear it again. In the poem, the speaker is not familiar with the undisclosed and mysterious phrase; she wants to hear and understand it – “Play it again, Saxon!” she implores, “Hush – Only to me!” |
Let me pause for a moment with a curious aside: I’m sitting in a local coffee shop as I type this. As I got to the part about “Casa Blanca,” the background music began playing the song “Key Largo.” That song includes these lines:
| We had it all Just like Bogie and Bacall Starring in our own late, late show Sailing away to Key Largo Here's looking at you, kid I thought that was weirdly other-worldly, no? LOL. Then to top it off, when I searched for the lyrics of the song, I discovered that it was written and sung by Bertie Higgins. Huh? Who in the world is Bertie Higgins? If you’d asked me who sang “Key Largo,” I would have guessed Kenny Rogers. |  |
I digress. Pray, pardon me, and I am sincerely indebted to your patience. Sweetness, heart, what watch? Yikes – ten watch! Such much! I must take my leave; however, I shall proceed with more on this poem in the morrow.
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