Critical Appreciate of the poem "Bring me Sunset in a Cup" written by Emily Dickinson

       Emily Dickinson-a great American female poet represented the farthest point in the 19^th century American Poetry. American poetry in regard to the adventures of the spirit is beautifully reflected in her poetry. She had the distinction of being a pioneer of 19^th century American Poetry. She was an anticipator of metaphysical poetry, a smeller of modernity and a defender of romanticism. Conard Alken described her as,

“The most perfect flower of

New England-Transcendentalism.”

          The poem “Bring me Sunset in a Cup” is one of the representative poems of Dickinson showing her attitude to nature in which she presents rich colourful and mysterious evening as well as presents her pleasure of seeing evening with all the fascination. The poem boldly and surprisingly suggests her phenomenon mystery and deep joy for evening time.

Theme of the poem

          ‘Nature’ is one of themes of Emily Dickinson’s poetry. Her description of Nature shows her capacity for delicate observation of Nature In present poem, she gives expression to her unbounded joy for sunset. The poem is obviously on the glories of Nature. The sunset, and the morning, the robin and the rainbow-all unmistakably point at the themes of poem. The poet’s treatment of a familiar theme is unconventional and as charming as it tantalizing. 

Critical Appreciation of the poem

          The poem has four stanzas of six lines each. All stanzas have many startling and finest poetic phrases as they have areas of obscurity. The very first line is startling in its poetic intensity where the sunset is reduced to the content of cup. Emily imagines morning holds a flagon which is filled by honey dews and sweet things. The morning is liquid and that liquid poured out in flagon is counted as evening. Finishing up is considered as the ending of the day. In a cool, gentle atmosphere dew-drops fall. They are precious and increase the value of evening. They are countable yet uncountable. Emily says,  

Bring me the sunset in a cup,

Reckon the morning’s flagons up,

And say how many dew;

          The poet is talking some serious matters and uses an imperative sentence: “Tell me how far the morning leaps. In saying ‘tell me’ she doesn’t want any answer but it is her surprise. The time is delightful. The blue sky is taking breaths. The breaths have been given by God. It is question that whether he gets time to sleep. In the second stanza, the poet describes the evening full of many notes. The robin’s ecstasy can not be valued in terms of the number of its notes. She says,

Write me how many notes there be

In the new robin’s ecstasy,

Among astonished boughs;

           Here Robin’s ecstasy reminds us of Keats’s nightingale pouring its ecstasy from the heaven. At same time, slow creature tortoise would make trips and remain busy. No doubt its trips would be few but it is not the matter. Contrary to tortoise bees are wondering everywhere.

          In the third stanza, Emily’s surprise is increasing more and more as she is watching the evening deeply. She is surprise to rainbow’s pillar and surprisingly asks us who laid the rainbow’s piers. Emily also feels surprise to known about how can they stand on? Her question is also regarding the spheres who lead them to blue?  It is actually the sky that binds these two piers. God leaves nothing to design or prepare.

          In last stanza, the poet describes that the house has been prepared in all this fascination. It is little Alban house. This house is full of surprise and variety. But the window of it is shut. So the poet’s spirit can not see it. The poetess put it as,

Who built this little Alban house

And shut the windows down so close

My spirit can not see.”

          Finally she wants to fly and go to find out who has created such mysterious world. Man’s soul is let loose from this world. As it flies away with implements; it passes far from this pompous world.

Poetic Quality

          By the style and structure, poem passed through very nicely. The joy of the poem lies in its rich metaphors and images. To think of bringing sunset in a cup is a supreme quality of the poet’s creativity. The abstract, conceptual, suggestive, matters have been made concrete. There are visual images like,

 “Bring me the sunset in a cup

Reckon the morning’s flagon up.”

          ‘leaping morning’, ‘rainbow’s piers’, ‘withers of supple blue’, ‘fingers string the stalactite’ etc are illustration this. The poem is full of autobiographical tone. Use of personal pronoun ‘me’ many times shows autographical tone. There is one more word ‘my’ related to ‘spirit’. Stress is on me and the poet’s mood becomes dominant in the poem.

          Moreover regular rhyme scheme has been maintained. A stanza is made of six lines rhyming aab cc. The poem is a fine combination of trimester and tetrameter. The poet has used alliteration to bring musicality. 1. How many trips the tortoise makes 2. Whose fingers string the stalactite

Conclusion

          To summing up, this is one of the finest poems on Nature in which Emily has fallen in love with evening. Emily is so deeply moved by the extraordinary Nature in which her feeling fetches a kind of ecstasy and exultation for the sunset. It is not only very poetic but adds to the mystery of God’s creation. The poem also reveals that Emily could not escape from the most important influence of the 19^th century Romantic poetry. It reminds us Collin’s romantic poem ‘Ode to Evening’. The poem truly exemplifies following remark of Albert J. Gelpi,

“Emily’s peculiar burden was

to be a Romantic poet with a

Calvinist’s sense of things; to

know transitory ecstasy in a

world.”