Poem 533 is one that we saw in the letters and dissected its implications for her relationship with religion (which is a complex one, of course). It struck me when I was reading this set of poems not only because it was familiar, but also because it feels so powerful after reading the poem where she contemplates her relationship with being a poet. ED says in 533 that poetry is everything, it “Comprehend[s] the Whole” (line 6). Reading and writing (and experiencing) poetry tells her all she needs to know about the world, all there is to know.

It seems that every time ED is metapoetic, my heart swells a little. I love knowing that she was so passionate about the art of hers and others’ words, and I love that she finds the artistic-ness of poetry outside of poems. Lines three and four of poem 546 are so precious to me: “But stopped, when qualified to guess / How prayer would feel – to me -” and I feel like this aligns the beginning of her creating poetic art with the beginning of her questioning her faith (or rather, questioning her religion). The last stanza of poem 546 really makes me feel this alignment–she has so gracefully thrown off the poetic balance of the stanza as she talks about her faith and/or religion being so hard to balance and to “poise” (line 20).

ED’s use of poetry as a way to digest the entire world and frankly, her existence, I feel these two poems really strongly represent what she believes in. And I think that, above all else, ED believed in poetry. The power of poetry, the devastation of poetry, the responsibility of poetry, the beauty of poetry, and absolutely everything in between.

This is my April 2 work.