This World is not Conclusion
- Author
- Emily Dickinson
- Date
- c. 1862
- Language
- English
- Country
- Form
- Four quatrains in short lines, with common-meter echoes, slant rhyme, repetition and abrupt dashes
- First published
- Poems, Third Series, 1896 (posthumous, incomplete)
- Themes
- faith, doubt, the afterlife
The source
This World is not Conclusion.
A Species stands beyond -
Invisible, as Music -
But positive, as Sound -
It beckons, and it baffles -
Philosophy, dont know -
And through a Riddle, at the last -
Sagacity, must go -
To guess it, puzzles scholars -
To gain it, Men have borne
Contempt of Generations
And Crucifixion, shown -
Faith slips - and laughs, and rallies -
Blushes, if any see -
Plucks at a twig of Evidence -
And asks a Vane, the way -
Much Gesture, from the Pulpit -
Strong Hallelujahs roll -
Narcotics cannot still the Tooth
That nibbles at the soul -
Commentary
Dr. Ruxandra RouxHead of Literary Research & Development
Emily Dickinson, around 1862. No known event stands behind it. It asks one of her central questions: is there something beyond the visible world, and can anyone know it for sure?
It opens like a declaration of faith: this world is not the end. Then the doubts arrive. What lies beyond is invisible like music, and as real as sound, but nobody can prove it. Philosophy cannot reach it. Faith keeps hunting for one small piece of evidence. The last image is a “tooth” that keeps gnawing at the soul. It was first published in 1896, in an edited version that cut the poem and made it sound more certain than it is. The editors wanted an answer. Dickinson had left a question.
Songs
The song made from This World is not Conclusion.
