J243

I’ve known a Heaven, like a Tent -To wrap its shining Yards -Pluck up its stakes, and disappear -Without the sound of BoardsOr Rip of Nail - Or Carpenter -But just the miles of Stare -That signalize a Show’s Retreat -In North America -

No Trace - no Figment of the ThingThat dazzled, Yesterday,No Ring - no Marvel -Men, and Feats -Dissolved as utterly -As Bird’s far NavigationDiscloses just a Hue -A plash of Oars, a Gaiety -Then swallowed up, of view.

c. 1861                        1929

This poem, which movingly evokes a recognition of the fact that everything disappears, is a fine example of Dickinson’s poetry of transience. The last line contains an echo of William Cullen Bryant’s “To a Waterfowl” (1821), which serves to indicate how far she had moved in 1861 from Romantic certainty toward Existential doubt.