Your Latin professor, who is seven months pregnant, Was extremely flushed and you felt obligated To walk her to her car.
You are still very much interested in my story— You talked to someone the other day For twenty minutes about it.
You do hope this isn’t the direction your life is taking, So formal, arranging times.
You will be free all day Next Wednesday not having to work And your afternoon class being cancelled.
But if I will suggest a time next week You are sure you will be able to drop by, you Probably can’t stay long but Wednesday right after Latin class looks the best to you right now so If that would work for me, let you know.
You are sorry that your life is not convenient For me, it is not too convenient for you either: Life is not easy in the hands of an irrational god.
Image: Emily Dickinson – Amherst College – Daguerrotype of the poet at age 17, circa 1847 – likely the only authentic, extant likeness of the poet
Emily Dickinson’s “‘Arcturus’ is his other name”
Emily Dickinson’s “‘Arcturus’ is his other name” reveals the speaker’s playful resistance to scientific classification and her determination to preserve the mystery, beauty, and spiritual significance of the world she experiences.
Introduction and Text of “‘Arcturus’ is his other name”
In “‘Arcturus’ is his other name,” the speaker objects to the intrusion of scientific terminology into her personal experience of nature. Stars, flowers, butterflies, Heaven, and the Kingdom of Heaven become threatened by labels, measurements, classifications, and maps.
Yet beneath her humor lies a serious spiritual concern. The speaker wonders whether scientific knowledge can ever replace direct experience. Her playful complaints finally become a defense of wonder, imagination, spiritual intuition, and her hope that Heaven remains a familiar place.
“Arcturus” is his other name
“Arcturus” is his other name – I’d rather call him “Star.” It’s very mean of Science To go and interfere!
I slew a worm the other day – A “Savant” passing by Murmured “Resurgam” – “Centipede”! “Oh Lord – how frail are we”!
I pull a flower from the woods – A monster with a glass Computes the stamens in a breath – And has her in a “class”!
Whereas I took the Butterfly Aforetime in my hat – He sits erect in “Cabinets” – The Clover bells forgot.
What once was “Heaven” Is “Zenith” now – Where I proposed to go When Time’s brief masquerade was done Is mapped and charted too.
What if the poles should frisk about And stand upon their heads! I hope I’m ready for “the worst” – Whatever prank betides!
Perhaps the “Kingdom of Heaven’s” changed – I hope the “Children” there Won’t be “new fashioned” when I come – And laugh at me – and stare –
I hope the Father in the skies Will lift his little girl – Old fashioned – naught – everything – Over the stile of “Pearl.”
Commentary on “‘Arcturus’ is his other name”
The speaker playfully challenges the authority of scientific terminology while defending a more intimate way of experiencing creation. Her humor gradually reveals a deeper concern: whether classification can cause human beings to lose their sense of wonder.
First Stanza: “‘Arcturus’ is his other name”
“Arcturus” is his other name – I’d rather call him “Star.” It’s very mean of Science To go and interfere!
The speaker begins with a seemingly simple complaint. She knows that the star has a scientific name, “Arcturus,” but she prefers the uncomplicated word “Star.” The capitalized “Star” preserves something that the technical name seems to remove: mystery.
Her complaint that science is “mean” gives the opening a delightful touch of humor. Science has apparently committed the offense of taking something beautiful and familiar and making it technical.
The speaker does not necessarily reject knowledge itself. Instead, she objects when knowledge interferes with personal experience. Her “Star” remains something capable of inspiring wonder precisely because she does not need to reduce it to a definition.
The word “Star” also seems more intimate than “Arcturus.” The speaker wants to retain a personal relationship with the heavenly object rather than allowing a scientific designation to become the whole of its meaning.
The distinction becomes important throughout the poem. Scientific language identifies, measures, categorizes, and organizes. The speaker wants to experience. Her preference for “Star” therefore becomes a defense of mystery.
Second Stanza: “I slew a worm the other day”
I slew a worm the other day – A “Savant” passing by Murmured “Resurgam” – “Centipede”! “Oh Lord – how frail are we”!
The speaker next turns from the heavens to a small creature on earth. She has killed a worm, and a passing “Savant” immediately converts the ordinary event into an opportunity for learned observation.
The strange word “Resurgam,” meaning “I shall rise again,” adds another layer of humor. The speaker seems amused by the learned man’s reaction because his elaborate terminology contrasts so sharply with her ordinary experience. She sees a worm; he sees an object requiring identification. The final cry, “Oh Lord – how frail are we”! introduces mortality into the scene.
The worm is tiny, yet its death causes the observer to reflect upon human frailty. The speaker therefore moves effortlessly from the physical world toward spiritual questions. The little creature becomes a reminder that life is temporary.
The speaker’s humor does not prevent seriousness. Her world is filled with death, but death also points beyond itself. The physical creature becomes an occasion for contemplating the larger mystery of existence.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s recurring interest in the relationship between earthly existence and a transcendent spiritual reality. That concern appears again here as ordinary nature opens into thoughts about mortality.
Third Stanza: “I pull a flower from the woods”
I pull a flower from the woods – A monster with a glass Computes the stamens in a breath – And has her in a “class”!
The speaker now presents a flower as another casualty of scientific classification. She simply “pull[s] a flower from the woods,” apparently enjoying its natural beauty. Suddenly, a “monster with a glass” appears.
The description is comic because the scientist has become almost frightening in the speaker’s imagination. The “glass” is presumably a scientific instrument, but the speaker transforms the observer into a “monster.”
The scientist’s instrument reduces the flower to measurable parts. The “stamens” can be counted and classified, but the speaker is interested in the flower as a living, beautiful presence.
Her use of the feminine pronoun “her” makes the flower seem almost like a little personality rather than an anonymous specimen. The individual flower possesses a presence that scientific classification does not adequately express. The phrase “has her in a ‘class’” is particularly important.
Classification gives the scientist information, but it also removes some of the flower’s individuality. Once assigned to a class, the particular flower becomes representative of a category. The speaker’s objection therefore concerns more than terminology. She is defending the individual against abstraction.
Paramahansa Yogananda offers an illuminating parallel when he describes spiritual investigation as something that should lead beyond discussion toward direct experience. He writes that spiritual seekers need “the satisfaction of knowing Truth by direct experience.”
Fourth Stanza: “Whereas I took the Butterfly”
Whereas I took the Butterfly Aforetime in my hat – He sits erect in “Cabinets” – The Clover bells forgot.
The butterfly provides an even stronger contrast between living experience and scientific preservation. The speaker remembers taking a butterfly in her hat, an intimate and almost childlike act.
The scientist, however, has placed the butterfly in a cabinet, where it sits rigidly displayed. The phrase “He sits erect” makes the preserved butterfly sound almost like a person forced to maintain proper posture.
The humor masks a sadness. The living creature that once moved among flowers has become a specimen. The butterfly has lost the freedom and movement that gave it its natural identity. The final phrase, “The Clover bells forgot,” is especially poignant. The butterfly no longer participates in the living world where it once moved among clover flowers.
The speaker therefore suggests that observation can become destructive when it separates a living thing from the world that gives it meaning. The scientist may possess knowledge about the butterfly, but the speaker remembers something different: the butterfly alive.
Paramahansa Yogananda similarly distinguishes between intellectual discussion and inward realization. He explains that meditation provides a means of experiencing spiritual truth directly rather than accepting it merely as “blind belief or dogma.”
The connection is important because the speaker also values experience over abstraction. Her butterfly is not merely something that can be preserved, named, and displayed. It is something she has encountered personally.
Fifth Stanza: “What once was ‘Heaven’”
What once was “Heaven” Is “Zenith” now – Where I proposed to go When Time’s brief masquerade was done Is mapped and charted too.
The speaker now carries her complaint into the spiritual realm. Earlier, “Science” interfered with a star, a worm, a flower, and a butterfly. Now it seems to have invaded Heaven itself.
The word “Heaven” has been replaced by “Zenith,” a technical astronomical term. This change is especially significant because Heaven is not merely a location in the physical universe. For the speaker, Heaven is the destination of the soul after “Time’s brief masquerade” is finished. The phrase makes earthly life seem temporary, almost theatrical.
But even this destination has apparently been “mapped and charted.” The speaker’s comic complaint therefore becomes more profound. If science can map the heavens, what remains mysterious about Heaven? The speaker does not appear to be rejecting Heaven. Quite the opposite is true. She cares deeply about preserving its mystery.
Her anxiety arises because something sacred has been transformed into something apparently measurable. The distinction between Heaven and “Zenith” therefore becomes a distinction between spiritual meaning and physical description.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s continuing interest in the relationship between earthly existence and a transcendent spiritual reality. Here again, the speaker refuses to confine existence to what can be measured by physical observation.
Sixth Stanza: “What if the poles should frisk about”
What if the poles should frisk about And stand upon their heads! I hope I’m ready for “the worst” – Whatever prank betides!
The speaker now turns the tables on scientific certainty. If scientists believe they understand the structure of the universe, what would happen if the poles suddenly “frisk about” and “stand upon their heads”?
Her imaginary catastrophe is deliberately absurd. Yet the absurdity serves a purpose. The speaker recognizes that the universe may be stranger than human beings imagine.
Her “worst” is not simply physical disaster; it is the possibility that reality may refuse to behave according to human expectations. The word “prank” makes cosmic disorder sound almost mischievous.
The universe itself becomes capable of surprising humanity. Instead of pretending that she understands everything, the speaker admits that she must remain prepared for whatever happens.
Her attitude contains a kind of spiritual humility. She is willing to acknowledge that human beings possess limited knowledge and that reality may extend far beyond what the senses reveal.
Paramahansa Yogananda likewise presents spiritual investigation as a disciplined search for realities that extend beyond ordinary sensory consciousness. He describes meditation as a systematic means through which consciousness can be turned inward toward a deeper spiritual reality. The speaker’s humor therefore conceals a serious virtue: she is willing to admit that the universe may be larger and stranger than her own understanding.
Seventh Stanza: “Perhaps the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’s’ changed”
Perhaps the “Kingdom of Heaven’s” changed – I hope the “Children” there Won’t be “new fashioned” when I come – And laugh at me – and stare –
The speaker’s anxiety becomes more personal here. She imagines that even Heaven may have become “new fashioned.” The scientific world has already changed the names and meanings of earthly things; perhaps Heaven itself has changed while she has been away.
The imagined inhabitants of Heaven are “Children,” and the speaker worries that they may regard her as old-fashioned. This image is amusing, but it also reveals her vulnerability.
Her concern is not really about fashion: ”New fashioned” represents a world that has changed so radically that her old understanding no longer seems acceptable. The speaker fears arriving in eternity only to discover that eternity has changed. The irony is delightful because Heaven is traditionally imagined as the place beyond time and change.
Dickinson’s speaker makes the infinite universe feel intimate enough to contain family-like embarrassment, affection, laughter, and acceptance. Heaven becomes almost like a household in which the speaker hopes she will still recognize everyone.
The capitalized “Children” may also suggest the innocent inhabitants of Heaven. The speaker hopes that spiritual innocence will not have been replaced by some new, unfamiliar order. Her concern ultimately reveals that what she seeks is continuity. She wants the spiritual world to remain recognizably connected to the one she has always imagined.
Eighth Stanza: “I hope the Father in the skies”
I hope the Father in the skies Will lift his little girl – Old fashioned – naught – everything – Over the stile of “Pearl.”
The final stanza transforms the speaker from a playful critic of “Science” into a vulnerable child. She imagines God as the “Father in the skies” who will lift her over the “stile of ‘Pearl.’”
The elaborate theological argument finally becomes a simple request for loving acceptance. The speaker calls herself “his little girl,” immediately establishing an intimate relationship between herself and the Divine Father.
She does not claim spiritual perfection. Instead, she describes herself as “Old fashioned – naught – everything.” The contradictory phrase suggests that she is simultaneously innocent, troublesome, imperfect, and completely herself. The “stile of ‘Pearl’” evokes the familiar Christian image of Heaven’s entrance—the pearly gates— while “stile” keeps the scene wonderfully rural and Dickinsonian.
Heaven is not imagined as an abstract theological doctrine. It becomes a little gate over which a loving Father helps his child. The image brings the enormous mysteries of eternity into an intimate, almost domestic scene.
Paramahansa Yogananda emphasizes the personal element of the search for God. Self-Realization Fellowship explains that the seeker may approach the Divine as “the Heavenly Father,” “Divine Mother,” “Friend,” or “Beloved.”
The speaker’s Father is similarly personal, intimate, and loving. She does not end by asking for an explanation of Heaven. She asks to be received by the Father whom she already trusts.
The poem therefore ends not with scientific certainty but with trust. After objecting to names, measurements, classifications, maps, and charts, the speaker returns to the simplest relationship of all: a little girl trusting her Father to carry her home.
Dickinson Riddles
“‘Arcturus’ is his other name” is one of Dickinson’s delightful riddles because the speaker never simply announces that science is wrong. Instead, she dramatizes the difference between knowing something intellectually and experiencing it intimately.
Arcturus remains a star whether it is called Arcturus or simply “Star.” The flower remains beautiful whether its stamens are classified. The butterfly remains a living creature regardless of its scientific category.
The problem arises when the label begins to replace the experience. The speaker therefore does not have to reject scientific knowledge in order to defend her own way of seeing. Her objections become increasingly spiritual. Science first names the star, then classifies the worm and flower, preserves the butterfly, maps the heavens, and finally seems capable of changing Heaven itself.
Yet the speaker does not end in despair. She ends in relationship. Her final hope is that the “Father” will recognize his “little girl” and carry her over the “stile of ‘Pearl.” The spiritual world remains meaningful because it is personal. The speaker does not need to understand every mystery before entering eternity. She needs only to trust that the Father will recognize her.
Paramahansa Yogananda’s teaching offers an illuminating parallel. He emphasizes direct realization rather than merely intellectual discussion, writing that the seeker ultimately comes to know spiritual truth through direct experience.
The speaker’s preference for “Star” over “Arcturus” similarly protects an experience that remains larger than its scientific designation. Her star is not merely an astronomical object; it is part of a universe capable of inspiring wonder.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s habit of privileging inner knowledge over outer awareness. That habit is especially evident here. The speaker does not require scientific approval before she can call Arcturus “Star,” cherish a flower, remember a butterfly, or trust in Heaven.
Her contemplative musing finally produces a charming spiritual confidence. The speaker can laugh at scientific interference, acknowledge her own uncertainty, imagine cosmic disorder, and still believe that the Father in the skies will recognize her.
The speaker’s confidence does not depend upon possessing complete knowledge. Indeed, she openly acknowledges uncertainty. What matters is that she retains her capacity for wonder and maintains faith in a reality that cannot be exhausted by scientific terminology.
The poem’s deepest opposition is consequently not simply between science and religion. It is between classification and experience, between an external description and an inward comprehension of reality. The speaker insists upon preserving room for wonder.
Paramahansa Yogananda likewise describes the spiritual path as a disciplined search for direct realization rather than a passive acceptance of religious ideas. Self-Realization Fellowship identifies this approach as a “scientific” search for direct personal experience of God.
This connection helps illuminate the speaker’s position. She objects when science claims too much authority over experiences that possess emotional and spiritual dimensions. At the same time, she remains curious about the universe and willing to admit that she does not know everything.
The final image is therefore both humorous and deeply tender. The speaker does not need to understand every mystery before entering eternity. She simply hopes that the Father will welcome and carry his “little girl” through the Heavenly gate.
The “stile of ‘Pearl’” becomes an appropriate final image because it is simultaneously ordinary and transcendent. A stile is something one climbs over in the countryside; Pearl evokes Heaven’s gate. The speaker joins the earthly and spiritual worlds in one affectionate image.
The poem has moved from a distant star to a worm, from a flower to a butterfly, from Heaven to the poles, from the Kingdom of Heaven to the Father. The movement becomes increasingly personal until the speaker finally stands before God as a child.
Science can name Arcturus, count stamens, classify butterflies, and map the heavens. But the speaker reserves for herself something that cannot be placed in a cabinet or charted on a map: her personal experience of wonder.
Her final hope is therefore not that she will arrive in Heaven as an expert who understands everything. She hopes instead to arrive as herself—”Old fashioned – naught – everything”—and to be recognized and lovingly carried across the threshold.
That ending captures the poem’s deepest charm. The speaker’s resistance to scientific interference is ultimately a defense of the mystery that makes existence meaningful. She wants the universe to remain large enough for beauty, uncertainty, faith, imagination, and love.
And so the speaker’s playful question about whether “Arcturus” should be called “Star” becomes a much larger question about the human desire to know. Knowledge can name the world, but the heart still wants to experience it. The speaker chooses “Star.” She chooses the flower before the classification, the butterfly before the cabinet, Heaven before the chart, and the Father before the theological explanation.
Her final confidence rests not upon possessing every answer but upon believing that beyond the world’s classifications there remains a spiritual reality that recognizes her. The little girl who began by objecting to science ends by trusting the Father in the skies.
The poem thus preserves the very mystery that the speaker fears science might take away. It leaves Arcturus shining, the flower alive in memory, the butterfly ringing with the forgotten “Clover bells,” Heaven still mysterious, and the Father ready to lift his little girl over the “stile of Pearl.”
This Dickinson poem actually dramatizes an idea regarding the effects of science that is similar to Walt Whitman’s much anthologized “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer,” wherein the speaker finds listening to the science of the heavens sickens him, so he moves outside and looks up at the stars from time to time—an act which he finds much more satisfying.
Image: Emily Dickinson – Amherst College – Daguerrotype of the poet at age 17, circa 1847 – likely the only authentic, extant likeness of the poet
Emily Dickinson’s “Low at my problem bending”
The speaker muses over a personal problem only to encounter a larger, calmer one that displaces all earthly calculation.
Introduction and Text of “Low at my problem bending”
In Emily Dickinson’s “Low at my problem bending,” the speaker bends intently over a private concern when a greater problem arrives. This new problem proves larger and serener, involving higher sums that dwarf the original figures.
The speaker then sets aside the “busy pencil” and lets the figures slip away. The “baffled fingers” question their own befuddlement in the face of this elevated demand. On the literal level the speaker appears engaged in arithmetic or accounting. Yet the intrusion of a calmer problem signals a shift from worldly sums to matters of the soul.
Low at my problem bending
Low at my problem bending, Another problem comes – Larger than mine – Serener – Involving statelier sums.
I check my busy pencil, My figures file away. Wherefore, my baffled fingers Thy perplexity?
Commentary on “Low at my problem bending”
Emily Dickinson’s “Low at my problem bending” dramatizes the speaker’s sudden elevation from a personal calculation to a higher, calmer demand that silences all earthly tools.
First Stanza: “Low at my problem bending”
Low at my problem bending, Another problem comes – Larger than mine – Serener – Involving statelier sums.
The speaker begins bending low over a private problem. At once another problem arrives, one larger than the original and marked by greater serenity. This new concern involves more important sums. The speaker senses that ordinary arithmetic cannot address the elevated scale now presented.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s habit of preferring inner information over outer, material level evidence. Here that same habit appears as the speaker recognizes the superior claim of the more placid problem.
Paramahansa Yogananda explains that the vastness is your real Self. The speaker, confronted by the larger problem, begins to sense that same vastness beyond finite sums. The contrast between the low bending posture and the calm elevation of the new problem suggests a movement from earthly worry to meditation on the eternal.
Second Stanza: “I check my busy pencil”
I check my busy pencil, My figures file away. Wherefore, my baffled fingers Thy perplexity?
The speaker immediately checks the “busy pencil.” All the carefully ordered figures are filed away as if dismissed by a higher authority. The confused fingers then address their own confusion. They wonder why their former skill proves useless before the statelier demand. The speaker’s tools of calculation prove inadequate once the larger problem appears.
Ordinary sums give way before the serene scale of the soul’s true concern. Paramahansa Yogananda explains that one must change consciousness from that of a mortal to a divine being. The speaker’s “baffled fingers” enact that very change as earthly figures vanish.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s reliance on mystical intuition to resolve riddles of existence. That same intuition now silences the pencil and leaves the fingers questioning their former busy work.
The final question hangs in the air, inviting the reader into the same contemplative musing that has lifted the speaker beyond finite problems to the calmer, cooler realm of the Infinite.
Idioms of myriad worlds spiral down the begging path. The grain feathers tangle in the sandbar on the rim, Ending in the dwelling of manifest wrath With stupor offering its clank to the whim.
No one dreamed the others into swerving. Few sacrificed fathers and mothers for priding. Several rounded the edges on the curving. Many chafed at the marble pine for hiding.
The scooped talons of white crowing Dip under the sea-broad sky. Fleet winged bandies blowing Stretch and dither on the fly.
No tongue shatters so many brains as munificence. No tooth clatters the rain so well as malfeasance.
Image: Emily Dickinson – Amherst College – Daguerrotype of the poet at age 17, circa 1847 – likely the only authentic, extant likeness of the poet
Emily Dickinson’s “Ambition cannot find him”
The speaker contemplates the profound transition from worldly obscurity to eternal stature following the quiet arrival of death.
Introduction and Text of “Ambition cannot find him”
In Emily Dickinson’s “Ambition cannot find him,” the speaker contemplates the dramatic transformation that takes place when a soul departs from its physical encasement. Death elevates the individual far beyond mundane human striving, creating an insurmountable distance between earthly concerns and spiritual liberation.
The speaker observes that earthly desires, emotional attachments, and social strivings lose all traction once a person steps across the mortal threshold. Transitioning into the unseen realm places the departed soul beyond the reach of both personal fame and human affection.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s habit of elevating inner awareness over outer circumstance. Here, the speaker asserts that the true elevation of the soul occurs far from mortal sight.
Ambition cannot find him
Ambition cannot find him. Affection doesn’t know How many leagues of nowhere Lie between them now.
Yesterday, undistinguished! Eminent Today For our mutual hone, Immortality!
Commentary on “Ambition cannot find him”
The speaker explores death’s shifting of a person’s status from complete earthly obscurity into infinite spiritual significance.
First Stanza: “Ambition cannot find him”
Ambition cannot find him. Affection doesn’t know How many leagues of nowhere Lie between them now.
The speaker begins by personifying “Ambition,” declaring that this driving human force can no longer reach or influence the deceased. Earthly drives lose all relevance once the soul departs the physical realm.
Human “Affection” also suffers a complete loss of contact, remaining entirely unaware of the vast expanse that now separates the living from the dead; mortal love cannot bridge this gap.
The speaker describes this spatial separation as “leagues of nowhere.” This phrase emphasizes the vast, unmeasurable vacuum that divides physical life from the metaphysical state. This vast void creates an absolute boundary. The departed soul exists entirely beyond the reach of human emotional calls or worldly seeking.
The speaker emphasizes that earthly perceptions fail to comprehend the realm of the departed. Human relationships are bound by space, whereas the soul transcends all material dimensions.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s preference for solitary spiritual journeys over communal ties. The departed soul embarks on a path where worldly bonds naturally dissolve.
The great Guru Paramahansa Yogananda explains that death is similar to a change of clothing. The speaker reflects this truth as the soul transitions into a completely different sphere of existence.
Through contemplative musing, the speaker recognizes that the vast distance between realms protects the departed soul. Unseen boundaries keep it safe from all earthly turbulence.
Second Stanza: “Yesterday, undistinguished!”
Yesterday, undistinguished! Eminent Today For our mutual hone, Immortality!
The speaker highlights a startling contrast, noting that the departed individual was “undistinguished” during earthly life. Yesterday, the person possessed no special fame or worldly acclaim; ”Today,” however, that same individual becomes “Eminent.”
The act of dying immediately elevates the soul above all mortal titles and achievements.
This elevation occurs because the soul has entered “Immortality.” Eternal life bestows a true dignity that no earthly praise could ever match.
The speaker refers to immortality as “our mutual hone,” implying that the material, earthly plane is not the soul’s native home: the old blue grass song “This World Is Not My Home” addresses and celebrate that theme. This shared destiny sharpens and refines human consciousness, preparing every soul for ultimate spiritual elevation.
Bill Monroe & His Blue Grass Boys perform “This World Is Not My Home”
Through contemplative musing, the speaker shows that true distinction comes from entering the eternal realm, not from acquiring fleeting worldly honors. Greatness is re-defined through the lens of eternity. What seemed ordinary in the physical world becomes glorious upon crossing into spirit.
Paramahansa Yogananda explains that the soul’s true nature is divine and eternal, far transcending any temporary physical identity. Dickinson’s speaker captures this profound realization through the quiet triumph of death.
The poem concludes with a celebration of the soul’s sudden transition. Entering immortality grants every individual an enduring grandeur that earthly life and a physical encasement can never offer.
Interviewer: What has become of your face? Mirror: It is like the moon; it has 28 phases.
Interviewer: When did those eyes become blanks? Mirror: Oh, when is not important. The question is, are they blank enough.
Interviewer: Where does that sallow skin come from? Mirror: From deep inside where sallow is mixed with saffron and clumps of leaves are torn from shadow boxes with fennel pollen.
Interviewer: Why fennel pollen? Mirror: Why fennel pollen, indeed! Better than mace and thyme, more elaborate than a whistle, sweet, spice, electric . . .
Interviewer: Why does your mouth obey those loose-hinged jaws? Mirror: It was never one to disobey. In the radical morning, scruffs of necks seek to burn, and limber goths slink back to the swamp.
Interviewer: How will your heart explain to your brain that it has shattered itself again over the sharp rocks of indulgence? Mirror: Now, I am a small pool of crystal water that rushed down from the Himalayas to gather fools who have no right to breathe the temperate air of Maya, yet . . . they travel on.
Image: Emily Dickinson – Amherst College – Daguerrotype of the poet at age 17, circa 1847 – likely the only authentic, extant likeness of the poet
Emily Dickinson’s “Success is counted sweetest”
Emily Dickinson’s “Success is counted sweetest” reveals the speaker’s conviction that victory is most deeply understood by those who have experienced its absence. The poem turns deprivation into a peculiar form of insight. This poem is one of Dickinson’s most anthologized and studied poems.
Introduction and Text of “Success is counted sweetest”
In Emily Dickinson’s “Success is counted sweetest,” the speaker presents success as something whose value becomes clearest through profound need. The person who possesses victory may enjoy it, but the person who has been denied success may understand its sweetness more intensely.
The speaker creates a little drama involving two contrasting figures: the victorious soldiers who possess the “Flag” and the defeated soldier who lies dying. The contrast allows the speaker to suggest that possession and comprehension are not necessarily the same thing.
On the literal level, the speaker is describing a battlefield in which one group has achieved victory while another has suffered defeat. Yet the language quickly moves beyond the battlefield toward a larger contemplation of desire, deprivation, perception, and the strange ways suffering can deepen understanding.
The image of “nectar” introduces sweetness into an otherwise painful setting. The speaker suggests that something desired becomes especially precious when it has been withheld. The defeated soldier, unable to possess victory, nevertheless receives an agonizingly clear awareness of its meaning.
This paradox gives the poem its particular force. The person who has lost may understand the value of winning more profoundly than the person who has won. The speaker thus transforms defeat into a peculiar kind of knowledge.
Success is counted sweetest
Success is counted sweetest By those who ne’er succeed. To comprehend a nectar Requires sorest need.
Not one of all the purple Host Who took the Flag today Can tell the definition So clear of Victory
As he defeated – dying – On whose forbidden ear The distant strain of triumph Burst agonized and clear!
Commentary on “Success is counted sweetest”
The speaker presents success as a mysterious experience whose meaning becomes clearest when it has been denied. The battlefield supplies the literal drama, but the deeper subject concerns the relationship between desire and understanding.
First Stanza: “Success is counted sweetest”
Success is counted sweetest By those who ne’er succeed. To comprehend a nectar Requires sorest need.
The speaker begins with an apparently simple statement: “Success is counted sweetest” by those who never experience it. The claim immediately creates a paradox because ordinary thinking assumes that the person who achieves success should understand its value best.
The speaker reverses that expectation. The successful person possesses the desired object, while the unsuccessful person remains painfully conscious of its absence. That absence produces an intensity of desire that possession may actually diminish.
The word “sweetest” introduces the language of taste. Success becomes something almost edible, something that can be savored like nectar. Yet the speaker does not allow the reader simply to enjoy the sweetness. She connects comprehension with “sorest need.”
The word “nectar” suggests something precious, desirable, and almost divine. To taste such sweetness would ordinarily require possession, but the speaker introduces a startling alternative: the deepest comprehension may arise through hunger rather than satisfaction.
The status “In need” is therefore more than simply lacking something. Need creates attention. The person who desperately wants something studies its value, imagines its qualities, and becomes intensely aware of what its absence means.
Paramahansa Yogananda offers a spiritual parallel when he explains that ordinary desire can produce temporary pleasure, while deeper fulfillment lies beyond the repeated cycle of wanting and satisfying desire.
The speaker’s “sorest need” likewise becomes a doorway to understanding. The unsuccessful person cannot taste the literal nectar of success, but deprivation makes the imagined sweetness extraordinarily vivid.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s privileging inner evidence over outer awareness. Here that tendency appears in another form: outward possession does not guarantee inward comprehension.
The first stanza therefore establishes the poem’s central paradox. What appears to be deprivation may actually produce a more penetrating awareness. The person without success may understand its value with an intensity unavailable to the person who simply possesses it.
Second Stanza: “Not one of all the purple Host”
Not one of all the purple Host Who took the Flag today Can tell the definition So clear of Victory
The speaker now introduces the victorious soldiers. The “purple Host” suggests a magnificent military company, while the “Flag” functions as the visible emblem of their triumph.
The word “today” makes the victory immediate. These soldiers have just experienced the excitement of conquest. They possess the very thing that the first stanza says the unsuccessful person understands most deeply.
Yet the speaker declares that not one of these victorious soldiers can provide a definition of victory as clear as the defeated soldier can. This claim deepens the paradox established earlier.
The soldiers who have captured the Flag know victory through possession. They have experienced the excitement, satisfaction, and public recognition associated with winning. Their understanding, however, remains limited by the very fact that they have succeeded.
The defeated soldier possesses no Flag and receives no public celebration. Instead, he receives the painful knowledge of what victory means because he is excluded from it.
The speaker’s choice of “definition” is especially interesting. She is not merely saying that the defeated soldier feels victory more intensely; she is suggesting that he can define it more accurately.
A definition ordinarily belongs to the realm of intellectual understanding. Dickinson therefore joins emotion and knowledge. The deepest understanding may not come from detached observation but from experiencing the painful consequences of what one lacks.
The “purple Host” also creates a visually impressive picture of victory. The soldiers appear splendid, powerful, and successful. Yet the speaker quietly strips that outward magnificence of its authority to define the experience.
The victorious soldiers possess the external evidence of success, while the defeated soldier possesses the inward evidence of its meaning. The contrast recalls the speaker’s recurring interest in unseen realities beneath visible circumstances.
Paramahansa Yogananda similarly directs attention toward inner realization rather than merely outward circumstances. He teaches that spiritual progress becomes evident through inner changes such as increasing calmness, joy, understanding, and security.
Thus the speaker’s battlefield becomes something larger than a military scene. The Flag represents outward achievement, while the defeated soldier represents the inward consciousness produced by deprivation.
The stanza ends with the victorious soldiers apparently holding everything that matters. Yet the speaker has already prepared readers to question whether possession itself constitutes the deepest form of understanding.
Third Stanza: “As he defeated – dying”
As he defeated – dying – On whose forbidden ear The distant strain of triumph Burst agonized and clear!
The final stanza brings the reader directly to the defeated soldier. He is not merely unsuccessful; he is “defeated – dying –.” The dashes slow the statement and create a dramatic pause around his terrible condition.
The word “forbidden” is particularly powerful. The soldier’s ear is forbidden to hear victory in the sense that victory does not belong to him. Yet he hears it anyway, and what he hears becomes extraordinarily vivid.
The image “distant strain of triumph” is both musical and military. The victorious soldiers may be celebrating somewhere beyond him, but their sounds reach the dying man. Their triumph becomes audible precisely because he has been excluded from it.
The speaker then introduces the astonishing phrase “agonized and clear.” The sound of victory is beautiful to those who have won, but to the defeated soldier it is agonizing. His suffering makes the meaning of the sound sharper rather than less distinct.
The dying soldier therefore possesses something the victorious soldiers do not: an almost unbearable awareness of what victory means to the person who has been denied it.
The poem ends without offering consolation. The speaker does not pretend that defeat is actually preferable to victory. Instead, she leaves readers contemplating the strange relationship between loss and understanding.
The dying soldier’s position also creates a profound irony. He cannot claim the Flag, participate in the triumph, or survive to enjoy any victory. Nevertheless, he may understand victory more clearly than those who celebrate it.
This final image turns the poem into a riddle about human experience. The reader must consider whether possession, deprivation, suffering, and understanding can ever be separated as neatly as ordinary thinking assumes.
In my earlier essays on Dickinsonian poems, I have discussed the speaker’s tendency to create little dramas that operate as riddles, allowing readers to discover meanings that are not stated directly. That same strategy is evident here.
The battlefield can therefore be read literally while also functioning as a larger representation of human striving. Success may be visible from the outside, while its deepest significance remains hidden within the person who longs for it.
Paramahansa Yogananda explains that true success ultimately involves something deeper than worldly achievement. He describes realization of the divine Self as “the ultimate success,” connecting genuine fulfillment with victory over the limitations of worldly existence.
Dickinson’s speaker does not explicitly make this spiritual assertion, but her drama leaves room for such contemplative musing. The victorious soldiers possess the Flag, while the defeated soldier possesses a painful clarity that outward victory cannot provide.
The poem’s final irony is therefore its most enduring insight: sometimes the person who appears to have lost possesses the clearest understanding of what the winner has gained. Success may belong to one person outwardly while its deepest meaning belongs to another inwardly.
Did you ever notice when you’re out walking In late November how some leaves, Caught by the wind, will kind of skip along beside you, It’s like walking with dogs, they scamper here and there And between your feet,
While most of them don’t budge, They seem to be enjoying a vacation from making green All summer; or maybe after fall has tumbled them From the trees and turned them many shades of brown, They’re just plumb tuckered out.
Driving Southwest in November
Sunday evening we are driving from Muncie to Indianapolis to fetch our granddaughter Samantha back home—after a few miles but even before we get to the Interstate you turn to me and remark about the fantastic colors of the sky: gold-pink-orange-rose-lavender light that
stretches and marbles across the many hued blue. I say it seems that there has to be an ocean over there to make that sky so rowdy with those tones, and then I say there is. You say how paintings like that look fake— but this is a gift.
