As If I Asked a Common Alms : Emily Dickinson's Nature Mysticism

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Circuit II - (09) As If I Asked a Common Alms (J-0323) (F-0014)

⁽¹⁾ As if I asked a common alms,
And in my wondering hand
⁽²⁾ A stranger pressed a kingdom,
And I, bewildered, stand;
⁽³⁾ As if I asked the Orient
Had it for me a morn,
⁽⁴⁾ And it should lift its purple dikes,
And shatter me with dawn!

^{(Below: an original manuscript version of a variation

of the same poem — this one from a letter dated 1884,

and without editing or imposed lineation):} ⁽¹⁾ As if I asked
a common Alms
And in my
wondering Hand
⁽²⁾ A stranger pressed
a Kingdom, and
I bewildered stand,
⁽³⁾ As if I asked
the Orient had
it for me a
Morn,
⁽⁴⁾ And it should
lift its Purple
Dikes, and
shatter me with
Dawn –

~ Emily Dickinson

Commentary adapted from Emily Dickinson's Poems & Letters

^(1-2) "He fathoms who obtains." ~ (J-1301) (F-1228)

^(1-2) "The 'hand you stretch me in the Dark,' I put mine in, and turn
away – I have no Saxon [language], now –" ~ (L #265)

^(1-4) "My flowers are near and foreign, and I have but to
cross the floor to stand in the Spice Isles." ~ (L #315)

^(1-4) "My eye is fuller than my vase — her cargo is of dew —
and still — my heart — my eye outweighs — East India
for you!" ~ (J-0202) (F-0228)

⁽²⁾ "The Savior's only signature to the Letter he wrote to all mankind, was,
A Stranger and ye took me in." ~ (L #1004)

⁽²⁾ "Your letter much impressed me —
Your every suggestion is dimension." ~ (L #964)

^(3-4) "I'll tell you how the Sun rose —
A Ribbon at a time —" (J-0318) (F-0204)

^(3-4) "Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door."
~ (J-1619) (F-1647)

^(3-4) "Shells from the coast mistaking — I cherished them for All —
happening in after ages to entertain a Pearl." ~ (J-0693) (F-0716)

^(3-4) "Lightning at our feet, instills a foreign landscape." ~ (L #641)

^(3-4) "[Recollecting where] 'Frogs' sincerer than our own
splash in their Maker's pools."
~ (L #207) (ref. possibly to Basho's famous haiku)

⁽⁴⁾ "I find ecstasy in living — the mere sense of living
is joy enough." ~ (L #342a)

⁽⁴⁾ "Humbled with wonder at your self-forgetting,
I delayed till now." ~ (L #742)

⁽⁴⁾ "Morning might come by accident —" ~ (L #912)

⁽⁴⁾ "The Orient is in the West." ~ (L #265)

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