Nature is what we see (314) by Emily Dickinson

Full Text

"Nature" is what we see –
The Hill – the Afternoon –
Squirrel – Eclipse – the Bumble bee –
Nay – Nature is Heaven –
Nature is what we hear –
The Bobolink – the Sea –
Thunder – the Cricket –
Nay – Nature is Harmony –
Nature is what we know –
Yet have no art to say –
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity.

Overview

Dickinson attempts to define nature and fails — deliberately. She tries sight, then sound, then knowledge, and each time corrects herself ("Nay"). The poem's real argument is in the last four lines: nature is what we know but cannot articulate. Our wisdom is impotent before her simplicity. The poem enacts the very failure it describes.

Line-by-Line Analysis

Lines 1-4

First attempt: nature is what we see. She lists visual phenomena — hills, afternoon light, squirrels, eclipses, bees — mixing the domestic with the cosmic. Then self-corrects: "Nay – Nature is Heaven." Seeing isn't enough; it's something larger.

Lines 5-8

Second attempt: nature is what we hear. Bobolinks, sea, thunder, crickets — again mixing intimate with immense. Another correction: "Nay – Nature is Harmony." Sound isn't enough either; it's the pattern behind the sounds.

Lines 9-12

Final attempt abandons the senses entirely. Nature is what we know "Yet have no art to say." The poem concedes defeat: human wisdom is impotent before nature's simplicity. Definition itself is the wrong tool.

Themes

• The limits of language
• Nature as irreducible
• Knowledge beyond expression
• Humility before simplicity

Literary Devices

Anaphora

Nature is what we see / Nature is what we hear / Nature is what we know — The triple repetition creates a rising structure that collapses — each definition fails and must be replaced.

Catalogue

The Hill – the Afternoon – / Squirrel – Eclipse – the Bumble bee — Rapid listing of disparate natural phenomena, mixing scale (squirrel beside eclipse) to suggest nature's range.

Epanorthosis

Nay – Nature is Heaven — Self-correction mid-poem. Dickinson revises her own definitions in real time, dramatizing the inadequacy of each attempt.

Historical Context

Written during Dickinson's most prolific period (1862-1864), when she composed nearly 800 poems. This poem engages the Romantic tradition of nature poetry (Wordsworth, Emerson) but subverts it — where Romantics celebrate nature's legibility, Dickinson insists on its resistance to language. Her Amherst garden and daily observation of birds, insects, and weather ground the specific details.