XVII.
She rose to his requirement, dropped
The playthings of her life
To take the honorable work
Of woman and of wife.
If aught she missed in her new day
Of amplitude, or awe,
Or laboratories for
Fitful experimentation,
It lay unmentioned, as the beaker
Develops web and weed,
But only to himself is known
The liquids they abide.
—
Dickinson’s final draft.
