Heaven—is what I cannot reach! (239)
Heaven—is what I cannot reach! (239) Lyrics
The Apple on the Tree—
Provided it do hopeless—hang—
That—"Heaven" is—to Me!
The Color, on the Cruising Cloud—
The interdicted Land—
Behind the Hill—the House behind—
There—Paradise—is found!
Her teasing Purples—Afternoons—
The credulous—decoy—
Enamored—of the Conjuror—
That spurned us—Yesterday!
About
Dickinson struggles a lot, in many, many poems, with religion, at one point saying she doesn’t like heaven because there’s no recess there (seriously).
This poem too deals with heaven, the place that’s so close, yet so far away for humans on earth. You might also read the quotation-ed “Heaven” as the Garden of Eden, which “spurned us” when God kicked Adam and Eve out of paradise. The poet seems especially rueful of this come-and-get-me game Heaven plays with humans.
One reading suggests the poem actually talks about Dickinson’s “old passion” (read: suppressed lesbian love) for her friend Sue, drawing on the lesbian Roman poet Sappho and a poem of hers where the lover is likened to an apple. But that reading assumes Dickinson was aware of Sappho’s work, which we don’t know for sure. Read the original and decide for yourself.
Q&A
Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning
- 3.Heaven—is what I cannot reach! (239)
- 6.A Book
- 52.Beclouded
- 63.Chartless
- 94.First Robin
- 115.Heaven (575)
- 122.Home
- 138.I gained it so (359)
- 161.I Never Saw a Moor
- 202.In This Short Life
- 220.It’s like the light
- 256.No Prisoner be (720)
- 273.Pain Has An Element
- 282.Remorse
- 284.Renunciation
- 330.The cricket sang
- 353.The Mystery of Pain
- 375.The White Heat
- 379.The Woodpecker
- 411.To fill a Gap (546)
- 420.Train
- 440.We play at paste
- 457.While Asters (331)
- 467.You said that I
- 472.You’re right (234)