A 809, by itself an extrageneric fragment or pensée, has links to three
documents: it is an intermediate- or fair-copy draft and variant version of
another late fragment composed around 1885 (THJ)(A
802); an early, variant draft of a message composed in late summer 1885
(THJ) and possibly sent to Sara Philips Colton Gillett (Oresman); and a trace (text altered) in a letter to Thomas Wentworth
Higginson (BPL Higg 116) mailed in early
August 1885 (THJ). Dickinson's handwriting is unusually large, ill-formed, and
reckless, suggesting that she was ill at the time of the fragment's composition or
that she was writing under unfavorable circumstances, in darkness, for instance,
or under great stress. For other examples of distorted handwriting, see A 848 and A 879.