One of the many brief extrageneric texts found among her late papers after her
death, Dickinson's final intentions toward this fragment remain unknown. It may
have been destined for incorporation into a poem, a letter, or another
composition; alternatively, it may be an experiment in aphoristic form. Though the
relationship between the text on A 539a and the canceled text on A 539 is unclear,
both are composed in the same hand, and the canceled lines, the last three of
which are variants for the first three, appear to complete the text inscribed on A
539a. Dickinson drew more than sixteen crossing lines through the text on A 539 to
cancel it. For a different interpretation of textual boundaries, see T. H.
Johnson, Letters (1958), PF 113, PF 122, respectively.