"Contained in this short Life"

By Emily Dickinson
[Analysis]
Contained in this short Life [1]
Are magical extents [2]
The soul returning soft at night [3]
To steal securer thence [4]
As Children strictest kept [5]
Turn soonest to the sea [6]
Whose nameless Fathoms slink away [7]
Beside infinity [8]
Poem 1165 [F1175]
"Contained in this short Life"
Analysis by David Preest
[Poem]
The 'magical extents' are the glimpses of Infinity that we get 'in this short Life.' Emily's soul turns to them as keenly as children, usually
'strictest kept' at home, turn towards the infinity of the sea. Lines 3 and 4 probably mean that the soul returns from the extents 'soft at night'
in order to be safe from anyone knowing about it; for in another version of the poem she says that the extents are 'discernible to not a
friend/except Omnipotence,' and that 'the soul came home from trips/that would to sense have dazzled.' Also Emily may have in mind the
verse in Mark's gospel which states that as Jesus returned from the mount of transfiguration with Peter, James and John, 'he charged them
that they should tell no man what things they had seen, till the Son of man were risen from the dead.' (Mark 9:9)
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