alive

A little bread — a crust — a crumb –
A little trust — a demijohn –
Can keep the soul alive –
Not portly, mind! but breathing — warm –
Conscious — as old Napoleon,
The night before the Crown!

A modest lot — A fame petite –
A brief Campaign of sting and sweet
Is plenty! Is enough!
A Sailor’s business is the shore!
A Soldier’s — balls! Who asketh more,
Must seek the neighboring life!

I live with him, I see his face;
I go no more away
For visitor, or sundown;
Death’s single privacy,

The only one forestalling mine,
And that by right that he
Presents a claim invisible,
No wedlock granted me.

I live with him, I hear his voice,
I stand alive to-day
To witness to the certainty
Of immortality

Taught me by Time, — the lower way,
Conviction every day, –
That life like this is endless,
Be judgment what it may.

If anybody’s friend be dead,
It ’s sharpest of the theme
The thinking how they walked alive,
At such and such a time.

Their costume, of a Sunday,
Some manner of the hair, –
A prank nobody knew but them,
Lost, in the sepulchre.

How warm they were on such a day:
You almost feel the date,
So short way off it seems; and now,
They ‘re centuries from that.

How pleased they were at what you said;
You try to touch the smile,
And dip your fingers in the frost:
When was it, can you tell,

You asked the company to tea,
Acquaintance, just a few,
And chatted close with this grand thing
That don’t remember you?

Past bows and invitations,
Past interview, and vow,
Past what ourselves can estimate, –
That makes the quick of woe!

A death-blow is a life-blow to some
Who, till they died, did not alive become;
Who, had they lived, had died, but when
They died, vitality begun.

Emily Dickinson’s 177th birthday arrives next Monday, December 10 (and she looks hardly a day over 150 . . .). Celebratory events are gearing up; we’ve already mentioned the reading and discussion at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, on Monday evening.

Closer to home (at least, to Dickinson’s home), the Emily Dickinson Museum has a few events planned:

• “my Verse is alive”, an exhibit that “explores the tangled private and public motives of several figures closely associated with Emily Dickinson,” closes on December 8.
• Emily Dickinson Birthday Lecture, at 4:00 PM today, Thursday, December 6, given by scholar and biographer Polly Longsworth; the title for her lecture is given as “‘Nothing but a Sword’: Austin and Mabel and the Publication of Emily Dickinson’s Poems.”
• Birthday Open House, 1:00 – 4:00 PM on Saturday, December 8; “the first 177 visitors will receive a rose, courtesy of an anonymous donor.”

The Amherst Bulletin lists some of the many entertainments to expect at the open house, including music, crafts, and a book signing by Barbara Dana and Cindy MacKenzie. If you find yourself in Amherst on Saturday, this is a must-see event!

If I should n’t be alive
When the robins come,
Give the one in red cravat
A memorial crumb.

If I could n’t thank you,
Being just asleep,
You will know I’m trying
With my granite lip!

I went to thank her,
But she slept;
Her bed a funnelled stone,
With nosegays at the head and foot,
That travellers had thrown,

Who went to thank her;
But she slept.
‘T was short to cross the sea
To look upon her like, alive,
But turning back ‘t was slow.