"The Lilac is an ancient Shrub"

The Lilac is an ancient Shrub

But ancienter than that

The firmamental Lilac

Opon the Hill Tonight -

The Sun subsiding on his Course

Bequeathes this final plant

To Contemplation - not to Touch -

The Flower of Occident,

Of one Corolla is the West -

The Calyx is the Earth -

The Capsule’s burnished Seeds the Stars -

The Scientist of Faith

His research has but just begun -

Above his Synthesis

The Flora Unimpeachable

To Time’s Analysis -

“Eye hath not seen” may possibly

Be current with the Blind

But let not Revelation

By Theses be detained -

Fr 1261

“The Lilac is an ancient Shrub” can certainly be grouped as a nature poem, the lines are full of natural imagery that is sublime in nature. However, like many of Dickinson’s nature poems, the nature included is used as a tool for metaphor for some larger truth or idea. The poem largely focuses on one scene, the sun setting behind a lilac on a hill. The choice of a sunset as a backdrop invokes the theme of mortality. Dickinson also seems to connect sunsets with divine revelation, as also seen in her poem “An Ignorance a Sunset”. In that poem, the sunset reveals to the observer an “amber revelation” that is both exhilirating and debasing, as it serves as a means for omnipotence to examine humanity.  In “The Lilac is an ancient Shrub”, the speaker attempts to experience a divine revelation through the examination of the sun setting on the hill. The speaker goes into great detail about the plant. However, the attempt to describe the lilac based only on observation seems impossible, and quickly becomes a metaphor for earth itself. The west becomes a “circle of petals”, the earth becomes a husk, and the burnished seeds become the stars dispersed in the sky. While the “scientist of faith” has just only begun his research through observation, the poem quickly shifts and gives up ascertaining divine revelation through observation alone, by stating that the flora is “unimpeachable”, it is unquestionable and above any composition of logic or understanding available to the “scientist”. The speaker begins by attempting to describe the lilac, but the description moves from the literal plant to the "firmamental lilac" of the sun setting behind it.

The speaker also brings in Christian scripture with the lines ”’Eye hath not seen’ may possibly / Be current with the Blind”. 1 Corinthians 2:9 states, “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.” The speaker asserts that this may be true and relevant for those that cannot see, but that revelation should be “detained” or limited by theses. Her word choice of “theses” in the last line is interesting. Although it follows lines that reference biblical scripture, and could refer to the detainment of divine revelation to religious ideas, it is also a throwback to the beginning of the poem. A “thesis” is something that is associated with empirical science, it is a theory that can be observed and tested. This scientific approach was found to be lacking in revelation by the speaker.  The end of the poem does not offer the “revelation” that was searched for, instead offers only a sort of circular understanding of knowledge and how it is revealed. Divine truth cannot simply be revealed empirically, nor it can it be revealed simply through religious invokement. It is almost as if any attempt to communicate or even understand the divinity of the scene is fruitless, it simply cannot be detained by language or human understanding.