My Life Had Stood a Loaded Gun

by Emily Dickinson

I’m nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there’s a pair of us — don’t tell! They’d banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody! How public, like a frog To tell your name the livelong day To an admiring bog!

I can wade grief, Whole pools of it, — I’m used to that. But the least push of joy Breaks up my feet, And I tip — drunken. Let no pebble smile, ’Twas the new liquor, — That was all! Power is only pain, Stranded, through discipline, Till weights will hang. Give balm to giants, And they’ll wilt, like men. Give Himmaleh, — They’ll carry him!

Is Heaven a physician? They say that He can heal; But medicine posthumous Is unavailable. Is Heaven an exchequer? They speak of what we owe; But that negotiation I’m not a party to.

I took my power in my hand And went against the world; ’Twas not so much as David had, But I was twice as bold. I aimed my pebble, but myself Was all the one that fell. Was it Goliath was too large, Or only I too small?

I know that he exists Somewhere, in silence. He has hid his rare life From our gross eyes. ’Tis in 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?

I felt a cleavage in my mind As if my brain had split; I tried to match it, seam by seam, But could not make them fit. The thought behind I strove to join Unto the thought before, But sequence ravelled out of reach Like balls upon a floor.

Admonished by her buckled lips Let every babbler be. The only secret people keep Is Immortality.

One of the ones that Midas touched, Who failed to touch us all, Was that confiding prodigal, The blissful oriole. So drunk, he disavows it With badinage divine; So dazzling, we mistake him For an alighting mine. A pleader, a dissembler, An epicure, a thief, — Betimes an oratorio, An ecstasy in chief;

The leaves, like women, interchange Sagacious confidence; Somewhat of nods, and somewhat of Portentous inference, The parties in both cases Enjoining secrecy, — Inviolable compact To notoriety.

Wherever runs the breathless sun, Wherever roams the day, There is its noiseless onset, There is its victory! Behold the keenest marksman! The most accomplished shot! Time’s sublimest target Is a soul ‘forgot’!

He fumbles at your spirit As players at the keys Before they drop full music on; He stuns you by degrees, Prepares your brittle substance For the ethereal blow, By fainter hammers, further heard, Then nearer, then so slow Your breath has time to straighten, Your brain to bubble cool, — Deals one imperial thunderbolt That scalps your naked soul.

Because I could not stop for Death, He kindly stopped for me; The carriage held but just ourselves And Immortality. We slowly drove, he knew no haste, And I had put away My labor, and my leisure too, For his civility. We passed the school where children played At wrestling in a ring; We passed the fields of gazing grain, We passed the setting sun. We paused before a house that seemed A swelling of the ground; The roof was scarcely visible, The cornice but a mound. Since then ’tis centuries; but each Feels shorter than the day I first surmised the horses’ heads Were toward eternity.

Bereaved of all, I went abroad, No less bereaved to be Upon a new peninsula, — The grave preceded me, Obtained my lodgings ere myself, And when I sought my bed, The grave it was, reposed upon The pillow for my head. I waked, to find it first awake, I rose, — it followed me; I tried to drop it in the crowd, To lose it in the sea, In cups of artificial drowse To sleep its shape away, — The grave was finished, but the spade Remained in memory.

I felt a funeral in my brain, And mourners, to and fro, Kept treading, treading, till it seemed That sense was breaking through. And when they all were seated, A service like a drum Kept beating, beating, till I thought My mind was going numb. And then I heard them lift a box, And creak across my soul With those same boots of lead, again, Then space began to toll As all the heavens were a bell, And Being but an ear, And I and silence some strange race, Wrecked, solitary, here.

Fame is a fickle food Upon a shifting plate, Whose table once a Guest, but not The second time, is set. Whose crumbs the crows inspect, And with ironic caw Flap past it to the Farmer’s corn; Men eat of it and die.

My Wheel is in the dark, — I cannot see a spoke, Yet know its dripping feet Go round and round.

Summer begins to have the look, Peruser of enchanting Book Reluctantly, but sure, perceives — A gain upon the backward leaves. Autumn begins to be inferred By millinery of the cloud, Or deeper color in the shawl That wraps the everlasting hill. The eye begins its avarice, A meditation chastens speech, Some Dyer of a distant tree Resumes his gaudy industry. Conclusion is the course of all, Almost to be perennial, And then elude stability Recalls to immortality.

To-day or this noon She dwelt so close, I almost touched her; Tonight she lies Past neighborhood — And bough and steeple — Now past surmise.

The Bible is an antique volume Written by faded men, At the suggestion of Holy Spectres — Subjects — Bethlehem — Eden — the ancient Homestead — Satan — the Brigadier, Judas — the great Defaulter, David — the Troubadour. Sin — a distinguished Precipice Others must resist, Boys that ‘believe’ Are very lonesome — Other boys are ‘lost’. Had but the tale a warbling Teller All the boys would come — Orpheus’ sermon captivated, It did not condemn.

I dwell in Possibility, A fairer house than Prose, More numerous of windows, Superior of doors. Of chambers, as the cedars — Impregnable of eye; And for an everlasting roof The gables of the sky. Of visitors — the fairest — For occupation — this — The spreading wide my narrow hands To gather Paradise.

All the letters I can write Are not fair as this, Syllables of velvet, Sentences of plush, Depths of ruby, undrained, Hid, lip, for thee — Play it were a humming bird And just sipped me!

My life had stood a loaded gun In corners, till a day The owner passed — identified, And carried me away.

Though I than he may longer live, He longer must than I, For I have but the art to kill — Without the power to die.

Good morning, Midnight! I’m coming home, Day got tired of me — How could I of him? Sunshine was a sweet place, I liked to stay — But Morn didn’t want me — now — So good night, Day! I can look, can’t I? When the East is red? The hills have a way, then, That puts the heart abroad. You are not so fair, Midnight — I chose Day, But please take a little Girl He turned away!