If we assume that the first two lines here do not mean what they say, and accept the silver-lined cloud explanation, we find that we are brought into a sentimental personal atmosphere in which _anger_ is anger as felt by someone, or bad-luck seen as the anger of providence or fate, and in which _smile-border_ is either personal happiness or good luck. Any such interpretation of _anger_ and _smile-border_, indeed, would involve us in some such sympathetic history of the poem. But if we consult the poem itself we find, after the first two lines, that any possible parallelism with an interpretation of this sort ends: _anger_ means just anger, _smile-border_ just smile-border. So much so do they mean just what they are that the rest of the poem is developed from their being just what they are: _anger_, anger; _smile-border_, the smiling border of anger which apparently separates it from some other kind, or concept, whose border separating it from anger might equally be called an ‘anger-border’. What are we to do, then, since the poem really seems to mean what it says? All we can do is to let it interpret itself, without introducing any new associations or, if possible, any new words. The rugged black of anger Has an uncertain smile-border. The transition from one kind to another, As from anger, rugged black, To what lies across its smile-border, May be love between neighbour and neighbour (Love between neighbouring kind and kind); Or natural death (death of one, Though not of the other); or discontinuance (Discontinuance of kind, As anger no more anger) Because so small is space (So small the space for kind and kind and kind), The extent of kind must be expressed otherwise (The extent of kind beyond its border Is end of kind, because space is so small There is not room enough for all Kinds: anger _angrier_ has to be Expressed otherwise than by anger, So by an uncertain smile-border); This will serve as a sufficient illustration of the method of letting the poem interpret itself. It was done without introducing any words not actually belonging to the poem, without throwing any of the poem away as superfluous padding and without having recourse to a prose version: the poem interpreted is practically itself repeated to three times its own length. It may be objected that it is still not entirely clear, but not that it is not _any_ clearer, that it could not be made clearer still by an increase in length proportionate to the need of the reader in question. For instance, if the reader is puzzled by the sixth of the original lines and cannot at the first reading persuade himself that _Because so small is space_ really means _Because so small is space_, yet sees that it can mean nothing else, he can repeat to himself: Because so small is space, Because so small is space, until he is convinced; or, perhaps,