Emily Dickinson

Enough

Biblical echo

God distributes bread like the parable of talents—unequal portions. The bird gets a loaf, she gets a crumb, setting up the poem's paradox about scarcity.

GOD gave a loaf to every bird,
But just a crumb to me;
I dare not eat it, though I starve,—

Starvation economics

She won't consume what she has. The crumb becomes more valuable as possession than as food—a reversal of normal hunger logic.

My poignant luxury
To own it, touch it, prove the feat
That made the pellet mine,—
Too happy in my sparrow chance
For ampler coveting.
It might be famine all around,
I could not miss an ear,
Such plenty smiles upon my board,
My garner shows so fair.
I wonder how the rich may feel,—

Colonial wealth

An Indiaman is a merchant ship trading with India—massive commercial wealth. She's contrasting imperial riches with her single crumb.

An Indiaman—an Earl?
I deem that I with but a crumb
Am sovereign of them all.

Paradox completed

Final inversion: poverty becomes sovereignty. The one with least claims to rule over those with most.

Source Wikipedia Poetry Foundation

Reading Notes

The Economics of Deprivation

Dickinson builds the poem on a deliberate economic paradox. She receives "just a crumb" while birds get loaves, yet claims "Such plenty smiles upon my board." This isn't delusion—it's a calculated revaluation of scarcity itself.

The key move happens in lines 3-6. She refuses to eat the crumb "though I starve," transforming it from consumable to "poignant luxury." The word "luxury" typically means abundance, but she applies it to near-nothing. By not consuming, she preserves—the crumb becomes permanent possession rather than temporary satisfaction. "To own it, touch it, prove the feat" treats the crumb like a trophy, evidence of God's attention even in minimal form.

"Sparrow chance" (line 7) is crucial. Sparrows appear in Matthew 10:29—"Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father knowing." She's the least of birds, but still noticed. The biblical sparrow represents God's attention to the insignificant, which Dickinson converts into spiritual capital.

Sovereignty Through Renunciation

The second stanza escalates from personal contentment to imperial comparison. "Garner" is a granary, a storehouse—she's claiming her single crumb fills entire warehouses in her perception. This is where the poem tips from gratitude into something more aggressive.

"An Indiaman—an Earl?" jumps from merchant capitalism to aristocracy. An Indiaman carried spices, silk, tea—the material basis of British wealth. An Earl holds inherited land and title. She wonders how they feel, then dismisses the question: "I deem that I with but a crumb / Am sovereign of them all."

"Sovereign" is the power move. Not "happier than" or "richer than"—she claims to rule over them. The logic: if she can feel abundance with nothing, she's mastered desire itself, which makes her more powerful than anyone enslaved to material accumulation. It's the ultimate Stoic flex, with a sharp Calvinist edge about who truly receives God's grace.