poems sent from dickinson to elizabeth holland


Thomas Johnson's Note on Poem 1569

MANUSCRIPTS: There are four, all written in 1883. The copy reproduced above (H H 77) was incorporated in a letter to Mrs. J. G. Holland written on 3 March; ED refers to Kate Holland's marriage on 27 September 1882 to Bleeker Van Wagenen, and the poem follows. The copy to Mrs. Edward Tuckerman (Amherst), identical in text and form, is signed "Emily -" Mrs. Tuckerman dated it in the margin "May 1883." The variant copy to Samuel Bowles the younger (privately owned: Bowles) was sent him in a note congratulating him on his engagement in October to Miss Elizabeth Hoar:

The Clock strikes One
That just struck Two -
Some schism in the Sum -
A Sorcerer from Genesis
Has wrecked the Pendulum -

The fourth copy (Bingham 99-9) was among ED's own papers at the time of her death. It uses the text of the earlier drafts with the line arrangement of the later one:

The Clock strikes One That just struck Two -
Some schism in the Sum -
A Vagabond from Genesis
Has wrecked the Pendulum -

In Genesis 2.24 man and wife are declared one flesh; the "sorcerer" clearly enough is God, who fashioned Eve from Adam's rib. Whom ED had in mind when she created the variant "vagabond" is less clear.

PUBLICATION: The message to Samuel Bowles the younger is in Letters (ed. 1894), 350; (ed. 1931), 338; also LL (1924), 347. The copy to Mrs. Holland is in LH (1951), 173.


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Commentary copyright 1998 by Martha Nell Smith, all rights reserved
Maintained by Lara Vetter <lv26@umail.umd.edu>
Last updated on January 22, 2001