Shall I take thee, the Poet said
To the propounded word?
Be stationed with the Candidates
Till I have finer tried -
The Poet searched Philology
And was about to ring
for the suspended Candidate
There came unsummoned in -
That portion of the Vision
The Word applied to fill
Not unto nomination
The Cherubim reveal -
F (1243)
The poet in the poem is trying to choose a particular word to complete his or her masterpiece, and after much effort, the perfect word is revealed. The process was clearly difficult. The poet almost gives up, ending their poetic endeavor. They almost go with the original word that they questioned from the beginning, but through a "portion" of a "Vision" the perfect word is revealed.
In this poem, Dickinson shows the difficulty that writers face when writing poetry. Each word matters immensely and requires articulate thinking for perfection. The words are questioned, pondered, and finally chosen. It is a spiritual moment, from "the Vision" when a word is decided upon as the "Cherubim" reveals it. It comes from above; it is celestial.
Dickinson uses imagery to show the mental process of choosing the perfect word by using verbs like "stationed," "searching," "ring," and "reveal." These words are often used in elections, showing the likening of elections and choosing the perfect word. She also uses adjectives like "propounded," "unsummoned," and "suspended" to continue in this imagery. Both sets of words relate to elections as we imagine them today. We have "candidate[s]" and "nomination[s]" in our electoral system, just as the poet has regarding words. There is questioning of the words like there is questioning of a presidential candidate, and finally there is a winner.
It is ironic that she is writing a poem where a poet is trying to write a poem. What she describes in her poem is likely the same thing she struggled with herself. In fact, based on the manuscript found above, many of her words had other options, which shows her personal experience with the subject of her poem. For example, the final version has “finer” in the last line of the first stanza, but she pondered other options like “further” and “vainer.” She also questioned using “probed” instead of “searched.”
The decisions that Dickinson made in regards to specific words in her poetry were crucial to the meaning of the poem itself. Each word is significant to the poem as a whole. For example, if she would have chosen “further” rather than “finer” in the first stanza, it would have changed the meaning of the line. “Finer” implies that the poet is trying to meticulously choose the proper word. She is trying the candidate words as if they were in court, seeing how well they stand in the line of fire. If she would have used the word “further,” it would have implied that the poet was taking more time to try the words, making it seem laborious rather than meticulous.
Just like the poet in the poem, every word Dickinson chose had to go through an intense process in order to be deemed perfect. Her poem not only describes her personal writing process, but the writing process that poets struggle through to produce a masterpiece.
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