For largest Woman's Heart I knew-
'Tis little I can do-
And yet the largest Woman's Heart
Could hold an Arrow-too-
And so, instructed by my own,
I tenderer, turn Me to.
'Tis little I can do-
And yet the largest Woman's Heart
Could hold an Arrow-too-
And so, instructed by my own,
I tenderer, turn Me to.
(F.542/J.309)
[1] Heart:: heart-to-heart (OED 1867) talk; heart-talk. largest:: the broadest, content of the talk.
[2] little I can do:: she cannot do such large heart-talk.
[3] largest:: the boldest. Large: having few or no restrictions or limitations; allowing considerable freedom (OED 11a). Heart:: affection, disposition.
[4] Could:: women's heart-talk could hurt Dickinson, but didn't happen because she turned to them but "instructed by my own." Arrow:: the ability to hurt. too:: if to hold an arrow is to hurt, then the "little I can do" means something Dickinson cannot do.
[5] instructed by my own:: under her own control.
[6] turn me to:: she turn herself to the talking, under her own instruction.
Hast thou, reader, ever heard the gushing heart-talk of opening youth, ere it became hackneyed in the phrases of "society?" ─ New Quarterly Review (1843)
Though the essay of cheap sentiment is excruciating, — and I need but to refer you to the chatty, slangy, heart-to-heart talks, generally by women, which one can find any day in the yellow journals, ─ The Yale Literary Magazine (1808)