The brain is the weight of God

While I was in literature class, it caught my attention the poet Emily Dickinson. She is not traditional at all. For example, she uses different punctuation, she does not use titles in her poems and the most important she explores her own soul. A lot of mystery surrounds her poems.

In this post, I am going to give my interpretation to one of her poems complemented with Johnny Lorenz’s essay: “The Weight of God: An Analysis of Emily Dickinson's Poem 632”.The poem I have chosen is the number 632 from “the complete poems of Emily Dickinson edited by Thomas H. Johnson”.

The Brain - is wider than the Sky-

For - put them side by side-

The one the other will contain

With ease - and You - beside-

The Brain is deeper than the sea-

For-hold them - Blue to Blue-

The one the other will absorb-

As Sponges- Buckets - do-

The Brain is just the weight of God-

For-Heft them - Pound for Pound-

And they wIll dIffer - if they do -

As Syllable from Sound-

“The brain is wider than the sky”. In this Mrs. Dickinson is not only establishing that the human brain is wider than the sky, she is diminishing nature’s complexity in comparison with us.

Mrs. Dickinson makes us compare the sky and the brain: “For - put them side by side-“.

”The one the other will contain with ease and You ”. The brain contains the other as a concept. This verse may express that through the use of our minds, we give a meaning to the sky. Without our minds the sky would be nothing, we transform the sky into a concept. It seems that for Mrs. Dickinson the man/woman is above the nature.

  “beside-The Brain is deeper than the sea- For-hold them“. This verse separates the man from the nature as something more complex, profound, just like the first stanza.

” The one the other will absorb-As Sponges-“. “The one” may be the sea and the other, which absorbs as a sponge, the brain. The sea would be a bucket, a container of water. This idea may explain how people absorb knowledge of the world, but the world just contains the man, and do not gain nothing from it. Again, the man/woman is bigger than nature.

“The Brain is just the weight of God-“. This stanza may be a questioning about faith. God is considered a bigger concept than the brain in our society, but she is saying that the brain and God are at the same level. Brain and God are the same.

“And they wIll dIffer: Here, she contradicts herself, in comparison with the previous verse.

- if they do -“: She is not sure about the idea that the brain and God are different or the same.

“As Syllable from Sound”. This comparison may give more power to the brain than God because a syllable is more complex than a sound. Maybe through the brain, God becomes a concept, we give it a meaning. Without our brains, God would be just a meaningful sound.

According to EmilyDickinsonMuseum.org, Mrs. Dickinson did not participate in public religious life, even though; she revealed interest in issues of faith and doubt. Deaths of friends and family members, the Civil War, and close observation of nature's cycles prompted poetic interest on religious themes throughout her life (Emily Dickinson and The Church, par.8).

In this poem, we can appreciate her interest in faith and a sort of questioning of God. Mrs. Dickinson questions herself if we as humans are greater than God. She is not clear about it, but she gives tremendous relevance to the person, the individual. Without us, neither nature nor God have a meaning. God would need our presence, our mind, to have “weight in this world.

This is my view complemented with another author’s ideas so, can you interpret something different? Can you add something else?

References:

The complete poems of Emily Dickinson edited by Thomas H. Johnson (Dropbox version)

https://www.emilydickinsonmuseum.org/church

http://seer3.fapa.com.br/index.php/arquivos/article/viewFile/40/33