A daily poem from the complete works of Emily Dickinson.
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It’s like the Light –
A fashionless Delight –
It’s like the Bee –
A dateless — Melody –
It’s like the Woods –
Private — Like the Breeze –
Phraseless — yet it stirs
The proudest Trees –
It’s like the Morning –
Best — when it’s done –
And the Everlasting Clocks –
Chime — Noon!
Tags: bee, best, breeze, chime, clocks, dateless, delight, done, everlasting, fashionless, light, like, melody, morning, noon, phraseless, private, proudest, stirs, trees, woods
If I could bribe them by a Rose
I’d bring them every flower that grows
From Amherst to Cashmere!
I would not stop for night, or storm –
Or frost, or death, or anyone –
My business were so dear!
If they would linger for a Bird
My Tambourin were soonest heard
Among the April Woods!
Unwearied, all the summer long,
Only to break in wilder song
When Winter shook the boughs!
What if they hear me!
Who shall say
That such an importunity
May not at last avail?
That, weary of this Beggar’s face –
They may not finally say, Yes –
To drive her from the Hall?
Tags: amherst, april, avail, beggar, bird, boughs, break, bribe, business, cashmere, dear, death, face, flower, frost, grows, hall, hear, importunity, linger, long, night, rose, song, stop, storm, summer, tambourin, unwearied, wilder, winter, woods
Whose are the little beds, I asked
Which in the valleys lie?
Some shook their heads, and others smiled –
And no one made reply.
Perhaps they did not hear, I said,
I will inquire again –
Whose are the beds — the tiny beds
So thick upon the plain?
‘Tis Daisy, in the shortest –
A little further on –
Nearest the door — to wake the Ist –
Little Leontoden.
‘Tis Iris, Sir, and Aster –
Anemone, and Bell –
Bartsia, in the blanket red –
And chubby Daffodil.
Meanwhile, at many cradles
Her busy foot she plied –
Humming the quaintest lullaby
That ever rocked a child.
Hush! Epigea wakens!
The Crocus stirs her lids –
Rhodora’s cheek is crimson,
She’s dreaming of the woods!
Then turning from them reverent –
Their bedtime ’tis, she said –
The Bumble bees will wake them
When April woods are red.
Tags: anemone, april, aster, bartsia, beds, bedtime, bees, bell, blanket, cheek, child, cradles, crimson, crocus, daisy, dreaming, epigea, foot, heads, inquire, iris, leontoden, lullaby, plain, red, reply, reverent, rhodora, thick, valleys, wake, woods
Whose cheek is this?
What rosy face
Has lost a blush today?
I found her — “pleiad” — in the woods
And bore her safe away.
Robins, in the tradition
Did cover such with leaves,
But which the cheek –
And which the pall
My scrutiny deceives.
Tags: blush, cheek, deceives, face, leaves, pall, pleiad, robins, rosy, safe, scrutiny, tradition, woods
Baffled for just a day or two –
Embarrassed — not afraid –
Encounter in my garden
An unexpected Maid.
She beckons, and the woods start –
She nods, and all begin –
Surely, such a country
I was never in!
It’s like the light, –
A fashionless delight
It’s like the bee, –
A dateless melody.
It’s like the woods,
Private like breeze,
Phraseless, yet it stirs
The proudest trees.
It’s like the morning, –
Best when it’s done, –
The everlasting clocks
Chime noon.
A lady red upon the hill
Her annual secret keeps;
A lady white within the field
In placid lily sleeps!
The tidy breezes with their brooms
Sweep vale, and hill, and tree!
Prithee, my pretty housewives!
Who may expected be?
The neighbors do not yet suspect!
The woods exchange a smile –
Orchard, and buttercup, and bird –
In such a little while!
And yet how still the landscape stands,
How nonchalant the wood,
As if the resurrection
Were nothing very odd!
I had a guinea golden;
I lost it in the sand,
And though the sum was simple,
And pounds were in the land,
Still had it such a value
Unto my frugal eye,
That when I could not find it
I sat me down to sigh.
I had a crimson robin
Who sang full many a day,
But when the woods were painted
He, too, did fly away.
Time brought me other robins, –
Their ballads were the same, –
Still for my missing troubadour
I kept the ‘house at hame.’
I had a star in heaven;
One Pleiad was its name,
And when I was not heeding
It wandered from the same.
And though the skies are crowded,
And all the night ashine,
I do not care about it,
Since none of them are mine.
My story has a moral:
I have a missing friend, –
Pleiad its name, and robin,
And guinea in the sand, –
And when this mournful ditty,
Accompanied with tear,
Shall meet the eye of traitor
In country far from here,
Grant that repentance solemn
May seize upon his mind,
And he no consolation
Beneath the sun may find.
Tags: away, care, fly, house, land, may, night, pain, sing, skies, star, sun, woods
