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Henry David Thoreau (12 July 1817 – 6 May 1862 / Concord, Massachusetts)
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Poems by Henry David Thoreau : 11 / 41
Indeed, Indeed I Cannot Tell
Indeed indeed, I cannot tell,
Though I ponder on it well,
Which were easier to state,
All my love or all my hate.
Surely, surely, thou wilt trust me
When I say thou dost disgust me.
O, I hate thee with a hate
That would fain annihilate;
Yet sometimes against my will,
My dear friend, I love thee still.
It were treason to our love,
And a sin to God above,
One iota to abate
Of a pure impartial hate.
Henry David Thoreau
Submitted: Friday, January 03, 2003
Read poems about / on: hate, trust, sometimes, friend, god, love
Poems by Henry David Thoreau : 11 / 41
Comments about this poem (Indeed, Indeed I Cannot Tell by Henry David Thoreau )
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How can his hate for one person be impartial. An impartial hate would be given equally to two or more people. You cannot be impartial towards one person.
the perfect thing to make my birth seem like a good thing
A practical fact of life well said in this poem!
that nice i love that poem
All I have to say is that I have a friend whose face I sometimes wish to punch in.
'Indeed, I cannot tell', but I can relate.
Good poem!
This poem is easy to understand. It is not philosophy, it is not split personality.It is simple honesty. There is some people in our life that we love and hate, for a reason that they can be very charming at times and very annoying at other times, you can not live with them, nor live with out them
greatt poem [[: [[; [[;
'Indeed, Indeed I Cannot Tell'-
Ambivalence expressed so well.
Is the poet Thoreau writing here as a poet or as the philosopher he so clearly was in such works as his renowned WALDEN? Was he using the literary device of a split persona in 'Indeed I Cannot Tell' to express his own doubts as to his various positions and stances - sometimes for /sometimes against // love vs hate? Does this poem of 14 lines indicate his struggle with doubt? How does one possess strongly held convictions without becoming a fanatic in the process? Was Thoreau like Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn in his discovery that the runaway slave was a human being like himself and should not be a slave at all?
I find the questions the speaker (the persona in the poem!) puts forth as typical of a divided personality, one who cannot find ground to stand on in the shifting winds of his own doubt. Indeed, self-loathing is often the result of such an interior struggle as anyone who has experienced such severe self-doubt can testify to. The 'loved one' that Straw posits is most likely that other self that can so irritate and annoy! How could I have been so blind? the victim cries silently in his anguish. But then again, if I was correct that first time, then what? And so on back and forth, until one cries for release! Am I 'pro-life' or 'pro-choice'? Am I my own DNA? Which has the rights when all is said and done?
I am suggesting that both Thoreau and Twain (and other serious writers!) were always struggling with such doubts!
Words walk the tightrope of love and hate, which is such a thin line. Hate to the point of love or love to the point of hate.