Lydia Humphrey looks back on a life spent walking to and from church, Bible under her arm, until she grew old. She never married and was alone except for the congregation, which became her family. She knows people found her odd and laughed at her. She also knows there were freer, prouder “eagle souls” who soared above the church and dismissed her entirely. But she doesn’t envy them. For her, the church offered the same kind of transcendence that poets feel in high, open air. Her final line is quietly triumphant: the poetic vision, which usually belongs to brilliant or rebellious spirits, was “democratized”—made available to ordinary, faithful people like her. The mood is tender, resigned but proud, and a little lonely, yet full of conviction.
Lydia Humphrey — Summary
Back and forth, back and forth, to and from the church, With my Bible under my arm ’Till I was gray and old; Unwedded, alone in the world, Finding brothers and sisters in the congregation, And children in the church. I know they laughed and thought me queer. I knew of the eagle souls that flew high in the sunlight, Above the spire of the church, and laughed at the church, Disdaining me, not seeing me. But if the high air was sweet to them, sweet was the church to me. It was the vision, vision, vision of the poets Democratized!