Four Trees - opon a solitary Acre -
Without Design
Or Order, or Apparent Action -
Maintain -
The Sun - opon a Morning meets them -
The Wind -
No nearer Neighbor - have they -
But God -
The Acre gives them - Place -
They - Him - Attention of Passer by -
Of Shadow, or of Squirrel, haply -
Or Boy -
What Deed is Their's unto the General Nature -
What Plan
They severally - retard - or further -
Unknown -
F(778)
This poem describes a simple landscape, containing four trees upon a solitary acre similar to the picture above. There is no “Design / Or Order, or Apparent Action” that the trees possess. They are alone in the field, as the sun rises to meet them, and their only neighbor is God. The acre gives them a place to reside, and a shadow, squirrel, and boy may pass by. However, they do not have a “Deed” or purpose that is identifiable within the poem. Their purpose is “Unknown,” and Dickinson ends the poem with the lingering questions of: what is their purpose? What is the unknown plan?
In ending with these lingering questions, Dickinson uses her word choice and form to slow the reader into contemplation. The first two lines of the final stanza are questions in themselves:
What Deed is Their's unto the General Nature -
What Plan
These questions would naturally cause the reader to think about their potential answers, but the next two lines slow down to give us time to think. Dickinson uses many dashes to slow the reading of the poem and the thoughts of the reader:
They severally - retard - or further -
Unknown -
The words she chooses also accomplishes this effect. “They severally,” or “separately,” slow down or continue; we do not know. The words she chooses are slow sounding and helped by the dashes, accomplish the effect of contemplative thinking upon the closing of the poem.
Vendler’s explication of “Four trees upon a solitary acre” describes the poem as “a meditation on nature as a permanent withholder of meaning” (326). In the poem, Dickinson describes the four trees absent of outside influence or purpose. They are not a human product, nor do they give humans any service. They simply “establish a reciprocity of place and focus” (327). The trees do not serve a general purpose but simply are there for their own sake; they serve a general good to the world in simply existing. Vendler goes into the divine purpose in creation, analyzing how Dickinson questions it when contemplating these trees. Do these trees have a divine purpose in the world or are they simply there without meaning? The trees are not significant but are simply part of the natural world, nothing special. Vendler argues that removing the meaning and significance of the trees makes them “unforgettable” as “Dickinson welcomes the absence of transcendental intelligibility” (329).
This idea conflicts with the transcendental hue of Dickinson and almost bring a modernism or minimalism view of nature, which is refreshing. Nature for nature’s sake. The trees provide a visual focus for the acre, aiding the acre in aestheticism. Again, nature is serving nature without considering the use among humans. The argument about God not designating the trees for a specific purpose, primarily no purpose to serve humankind, takes away the man-centered view that we generally have towards nature. We apply meaning to things in this life, but Dickinson, as argued by Vendler, questions that response by removing the meaning and significance. In so doing, however, Dickinson provided the trees with meaning by redefining them for the sake of existence.
Vendler, Helen. “778.” Dickinson: Selected Poems and Commentaries. Belknap Press: An Imprint of Harvard University Press, 2012, pp. 326 - 329.
https://pixels.com/featured/four-trees-john-edwards.html
They severally - retard - or further -
Unknown -
F(778)
This poem describes a simple landscape, containing four trees upon a solitary acre similar to the picture above. There is no “Design / Or Order, or Apparent Action” that the trees possess. They are alone in the field, as the sun rises to meet them, and their only neighbor is God. The acre gives them a place to reside, and a shadow, squirrel, and boy may pass by. However, they do not have a “Deed” or purpose that is identifiable within the poem. Their purpose is “Unknown,” and Dickinson ends the poem with the lingering questions of: what is their purpose? What is the unknown plan?
In ending with these lingering questions, Dickinson uses her word choice and form to slow the reader into contemplation. The first two lines of the final stanza are questions in themselves:
What Deed is Their's unto the General Nature -
What Plan
These questions would naturally cause the reader to think about their potential answers, but the next two lines slow down to give us time to think. Dickinson uses many dashes to slow the reading of the poem and the thoughts of the reader:
They severally - retard - or further -
Unknown -
The words she chooses also accomplishes this effect. “They severally,” or “separately,” slow down or continue; we do not know. The words she chooses are slow sounding and helped by the dashes, accomplish the effect of contemplative thinking upon the closing of the poem.
Vendler’s explication of “Four trees upon a solitary acre” describes the poem as “a meditation on nature as a permanent withholder of meaning” (326). In the poem, Dickinson describes the four trees absent of outside influence or purpose. They are not a human product, nor do they give humans any service. They simply “establish a reciprocity of place and focus” (327). The trees do not serve a general purpose but simply are there for their own sake; they serve a general good to the world in simply existing. Vendler goes into the divine purpose in creation, analyzing how Dickinson questions it when contemplating these trees. Do these trees have a divine purpose in the world or are they simply there without meaning? The trees are not significant but are simply part of the natural world, nothing special. Vendler argues that removing the meaning and significance of the trees makes them “unforgettable” as “Dickinson welcomes the absence of transcendental intelligibility” (329).
This idea conflicts with the transcendental hue of Dickinson and almost bring a modernism or minimalism view of nature, which is refreshing. Nature for nature’s sake. The trees provide a visual focus for the acre, aiding the acre in aestheticism. Again, nature is serving nature without considering the use among humans. The argument about God not designating the trees for a specific purpose, primarily no purpose to serve humankind, takes away the man-centered view that we generally have towards nature. We apply meaning to things in this life, but Dickinson, as argued by Vendler, questions that response by removing the meaning and significance. In so doing, however, Dickinson provided the trees with meaning by redefining them for the sake of existence.
Vendler, Helen. “778.” Dickinson: Selected Poems and Commentaries. Belknap Press: An Imprint of Harvard University Press, 2012, pp. 326 - 329.
https://pixels.com/featured/four-trees-john-edwards.html
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