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Tracing Fragments/Stanzas
The following are transcriptions of H 157. The first is separated from the second by a centered line approximately half the length of a full text line. The second is followed by the same sort of line. The top of the page (Manuscript Books) identifies the manuscript as Fascicle 24, H 157.
| Manuscript Books, p 555, 1st entry, (1712) in margin. |
'Twould start them -
We - could tremble -
But since we got a
Bomb -
And held it in our Bosom
Nay - Hold it - it is calm -
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| Manuscript Books, p 555, second entry, (443) in margin. |
Therefore - we do life's
labor -
Though life's Reward - be done -
With scrupulous exactness -
To hold our Senses - on -
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Brief History
Miss Graves was the copyist. "All Miss Graves copied was the twenty-four lines on sheet 19 that constitute 'I tie my Hat.' ...she made a separate transcript for each of the stanzas on H 157" (Franklin E42).
Hypothesizing that the packet was already untied, Franklin notes, "At the end of the Graves transcript ... Mrs. Todd copied the extra two stanzas, but next to the second stanza she added the query, 'Is this part of it?' " (E42). He adds that Mrs. Todd wasn't even sure that lines 13-24 were part of "I tie my Hat." At the end of line 12 of the transcript she had also written, "Is this another?" (E42).
Mrs. Todd made an "independent transcript of 'Therefore - we do life's labor'" (E42).
"In the 1891 notebook she [Mrs. Todd] ranked the Graves transcript of 'I tie my Hat' as a B poem while each of the other [H 157] stanzas was separately classed as a C" (E43).
Are they separate or what?
"It might be thought that these two stanzas are separate poems, belonging to packet 29, since both are followed by the line that usually marks the end of a poem in the packets. But Emily Dickinson did not commonly copy two small poems like these and then leave two-thirds of the available space empty....The poet apparently used this half sheet to add stanzas to one of the other poems in packet 29" (Franklin E43).
Franklin comes to the conclusion:
"The other lines on H 157 ... must then be either alternate lines or a conclusion to the whole poem. The former was most likely the poet's intention" (Franklin E46).
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