"Behold the atom I preferred / To all the lists of clay!"
— Dickinson, Emily (1830-1886)
Author
Work Title
Place of Publication
Boston
Publisher
Robert Brothers
Date
1892
Metaphor
"Behold the atom I preferred / To all the lists of clay!"
Metaphor in Context
[I. CHOICE.]
Of all the souls that stand create
I have elected one.
When sense from spirit files away,
And subterfuge is done;
When that which is and that which was
Apart, intrinsic, stand,
And this brief tragedy of flesh
Is shifted like a sand;
When figures show their royal front
And mists are carved away,—
Behold the atom I preferred
To all the lists of clay!
(p. 89)
Of all the souls that stand create
I have elected one.
When sense from spirit files away,
And subterfuge is done;
When that which is and that which was
Apart, intrinsic, stand,
And this brief tragedy of flesh
Is shifted like a sand;
When figures show their royal front
And mists are carved away,—
Behold the atom I preferred
To all the lists of clay!
(p. 89)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Dickinson, Emily. Poems by Emily Dickinson: Second Series Ed. Mabel Loomis Todd and T. W. Higginson (Robert Brothers: Boston, 1892). <Link to UVA e-Text Center><Link to Google Books>
Date of Entry
12/31/2010
