invests—financial metaphor
Not just 'has' charm but actively invests it, like capital earning interest. The face gains value from being partially hidden.
mesh—literal veil
The actual fabric of a mourning or modesty veil. Victorian women wore these in public; seeing through mesh meant seeing imperfectly.
interview—meeting face-to-face
Old meaning: any direct encounter or view. The fear is that actually seeing clearly would destroy the desire to see.
Reading Notes
The Economics of Mystery
Dickinson uses commercial language for desire: charm "invests," want is "satisfied," and seeing might "annul" (legally cancel) the whole transaction. The poem treats attraction as a business deal where scarcity creates value.
The veil is both literal (Victorian women wore mesh veils in mourning or for modesty) and metaphorical. The woman won't "lift her veil / For fear it be dispelled"—where "it" could mean the charm, the veil itself, or her own power. The ambiguity is deliberate.
"Wishes, and denies"—she actively maintains the distance. This isn't passivity; it's strategy. She knows that "image satisfies" better than reality could. The poem argues that imagination fed by partial glimpses beats full knowledge.
Dickinson's Permanent Distance
CONTEXT Dickinson famously withdrew from society in her thirties, dressed in white, and spoke to visitors from behind doors or at the top of stairs. She understood chosen distance.
The poem's psychology is counterintuitive: the lady doesn't want what she wants. "Interview annul a want / That image satisfies" means the wanting itself is what she's protecting. Full knowledge would kill desire, so she "peers beyond her mesh" but keeps the mesh in place.
Notice the poem never says the face is beautiful—only that it's "imperfectly beheld." The charm exists because of the imperfection, not despite it. Dickinson is mapping how mystery manufactures value, whether in romance, faith, or her own reclusive persona.