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Emily DickinsonA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
There is a paradox at the core of Poem 683. Mysteries explored are supposed to yield to clarity. The reward for pondering the mysteries of the cosmos is theoretically the gift of insight, the reassuring illumination of some sort of epiphany. If a poem explores love, for instance, the assumption is that the poet will offer in the end an insight into the heart that will help illuminate the mysterious energy of love. In Poem 683, however, which up front and openly sets out to explore the nature of the soul, starts with a contradictory mystery and then refuses to resolve that contradiction. It allows two opposing ideas to exist at the same time. The soul is both your friend and your foe. The soul will be at peace and in charge only when your heart and your body agree to abide by its power, a reality that for most people would be hard to imagine.
Thus, the soul is omnipotent and impotent, both imperial and surrendered, both awesome and pathetic. The poem then explores an essential mystery (what is the soul?) that, in exploring it, not only refuses to reveal itself but in fact becomes more mysterious.
By Emily Dickinson
A Bird, came down the Walk
Emily Dickinson
A Clock stopped—
Emily Dickinson
A narrow Fellow in the Grass (1096)
Emily Dickinson
Because I Could Not Stop for Death
Emily Dickinson
"Faith" is a fine invention
Emily Dickinson
Fame Is a Fickle Food (1702)
Emily Dickinson
Hope is a strange invention
Emily Dickinson
"Hope" Is the Thing with Feathers
Emily Dickinson
I Can Wade Grief
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Cleaving in my Mind
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain
Emily Dickinson
If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking
Emily Dickinson
If I should die
Emily Dickinson
If you were coming in the fall
Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz — when I died
Emily Dickinson
I'm Nobody! Who Are You?
Emily Dickinson
Much Madness is divinest Sense—
Emily Dickinson
Success Is Counted Sweetest
Emily Dickinson
Tell all the truth but tell it slant
Emily Dickinson
The Only News I Know
Emily Dickinson