Complete Poems by Emily Dickinson

by Emily Dickinson

  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.

  XV.

  I've seen a dying eye

  Run round and round a room

  In search of something, as it seemed,

  Then cloudier become;

  And then, obscure with fog,

  And then be soldered down,

  Without disclosing what it be,

  'T were blessed to have seen.

  XVI.

  REFUGE.

  The clouds their backs together laid,

  The north begun to push,

  The forests galloped till they fell,

  The lightning skipped like mice;

  The thunder crumbled like a stuff —

  How good to be safe in tombs,

  Where nature's temper cannot reach,

  Nor vengeance ever comes!

  XVII.

  I never saw a moor,

  I never saw the sea;

  Yet know I how the heather looks,

  And what a wave must be.

  I never spoke with God,

  Nor visited in heaven;

  Yet certain am I of the spot

  As if the chart were given.

  XVIII.

  PLAYMATES.

  God permits industrious angels

  Afternoons to play.

  I met one, — forgot my school-mates,

  All, for him, straightway.

  God calls home the angels promptly

  At the setting sun;

  I missed mine. How dreary marbles,

  After playing Crown!

  XIX.

  To know just how he suffered would be dear;

  To know if any human eyes were near

  To whom he could intrust his wavering gaze,

  Until it settled firm on Paradise.

  To know if he was patient, part content,

  Was dying as he thought, or different;

  Was it a pleasant day to die,

  And did the sunshine face his way?

  What was his furthest mind, of home, or God,

  Or what the distant say

  At news that he ceased human nature

  On such a day?

  And wishes, had he any?

  Just his sigh, accented,

  Had been legible to me.

  And was he confident until

  Ill fluttered out in everlasting well?

  And if he spoke, what name was best,

  What first,

  What one broke off with

  At the drowsiest?

  Was he afraid, or tranquil?

  Might he know

  How conscious consciousness could grow,

  Till love that was, and love too blest to be,

  Meet — and the junction be Eternity?

  XX.

  The last night that she lived,

  It was a common night,

  Except the dying; this to us

  Made nature different.

  We noticed smallest things, —

  Things overlooked before,

  By this great light upon our minds

  Italicized, as 't were.

  That others could exist

  While she must finish quite,

  A jealousy for her arose

  So nearly infinite.

  We waited while she passed;

  It was a narrow time,

  Too jostled were our souls to speak,

  At length the notice came.

  She mentioned, and forgot;

  Then lightly as a reed

  Bent to the water, shivered scarce,

  Consented, and was dead.

  And we, we placed the hair,

  And drew the head erect;

  And then an awful leisure was,

  Our faith to regulate.

  XXI.

  THE FIRST LESSON.

  Not in this world to see his face

  Sounds long, until I read the place

  Where this is said to be

  But just the primer to a life

  Unopened, rare, upon the shelf,

  Clasped yet to him and me.

  And yet, my primer suits me so

  I would not choose a book to know

  Than that, be sweeter wise;

  Might some one else so learned be,

  And leave me just my A B C,

  Himself could have the skies.

  XXII.

  The bustle in a house

  The morning after death

  Is solemnest of industries

  Enacted upon earth, —

  The sweeping up the heart,

  And putting love away

  We shall not want to use again

  Until eternity.

  XXIII.

  I reason, earth is short,

  And anguish absolute,

  And many hurt;

  But what of that?

  I reason, we could die:

  The best vitality

  Cannot excel decay;

  But what of that?

  I reason that in heaven

  Somehow, it will be even,

  Some new equation given;

  But what of that?

  XXIV.

  Afraid? Of whom am I afraid?

  Not death; for who is he?

  The porter of my father's lodge

  As much abasheth me.

  Of life? 'T were odd I fear a thing

  That comprehendeth me

  In one or more existences

  At Deity's decree.

  Of resurrection? Is the east

  Afraid to trust the morn

  With her fastidious forehead?

  As soon impeach my crown!

  XXV.

  DYING.

  The sun kept setting, setting still;

  No hue of afternoon

  Upon the village I perceived, —

  From house to house 't was noon.

  The dusk kept dropping, dropping still;

  No dew upon the grass,

  But only on my forehead stopped,

  And wandered in my face.

  My feet kept drowsing, drowsing still,

  My fingers were awake;

  Yet why so little sound myself

  Unto my seeming make?

  How well I knew the light before!

  I could not see it now.

  'T is dying, I am doing; but

  I'm not afraid to know.

  XXVI.

  Two swimmers wrestled on the spar

  Until the morning sun,

  When one turned smiling to the land.

  O God, the other one!

  The stray ships passing spied a face

  Upon the waters borne,

  With eyes in death still begging raised,

  And hands beseeching thrown.

  XXVII.

  THE CHARIOT.

  Because I could not stop for Death,

  He kindly stopped for me;

  The carriage held but just ourselves

  And Immortality.

  We slowly drove, he knew no haste,

  And I had put away

  My labor, and my leisure too,

  For his civility.

  We passed the school where children played,

  Their lessons scarcely done;

  We passed the fields of gazing grain,

  We passed the setting sun.

  We paused before a house that seemed

  A swelling of the ground;

  The roof was scarcely visible,

  The cornice but a mound.

  Since then 't is centuries; but each

  Feels shorter than the day

  I first surmised the horses' heads

  Were toward eternity.

  XXVIII.

  S
he went as quiet as the dew

  From a familiar flower.

  Not like the dew did she return

  At the accustomed hour!

  She dropt as softly as a star

  From out my summer's eve;

  Less skilful than Leverrier

  It's sorer to believe!

  XXIX.

  RESURGAM.

  At last to be identified!

  At last, the lamps upon thy side,

  The rest of life to see!

  Past midnight, past the morning star!

  Past sunrise! Ah! what leagues there are

  Between our feet and day!

  XXX.

  Except to heaven, she is nought;

  Except for angels, lone;

  Except to some wide-wandering bee,

  A flower superfluous blown;

  Except for winds, provincial;

  Except by butterflies,

  Unnoticed as a single dew

  That on the acre lies.

  The smallest housewife in the grass,

  Yet take her from the lawn,

  And somebody has lost the face

  That made existence home!

  XXXI.

  Death is a dialogue between

  The spirit and the dust.

  "Dissolve," says Death. The Spirit, "Sir,

  I have another trust."

  Death doubts it, argues from the ground.

  The Spirit turns away,

  Just laying off, for evidence,

  An overcoat of clay.

  XXXII.

  It was too late for man,

  But early yet for God;

  Creation impotent to help,

  But prayer remained our side.

  How excellent the heaven,

  When earth cannot be had;

  How hospitable, then, the face

  Of our old neighbor, God!

  XXXIII.

  ALONG THE POTOMAC.

  When I was small, a woman died.

  To-day her only boy

  Went up from the Potomac,

  His face all victory,

  To look at her; how slowly

  The seasons must have turned

  Till bullets clipt an angle,

  And he passed quickly round!

  If pride shall be in Paradise

  I never can decide;

  Of their imperial conduct,

  No person testified.

  But proud in apparition,

  That woman and her boy

  Pass back and forth before my brain,

  As ever in the sky.

  XXXIV.

  The daisy follows soft the sun,

  And when his golden walk is done,

  Sits shyly at his feet.

  He, waking, finds the flower near.

  "Wherefore, marauder, art thou here?"

  "Because, sir, love is sweet!"

  We are the flower, Thou the sun!

  Forgive us, if as days decline,

  We nearer steal to Thee, —

  Enamoured of the parting west,

  The peace, the flight, the amethyst,

  Night's possibility!

  XXXV.

  EMANCIPATION.

  No rack can torture me,

  My soul's at liberty

  Behind this mortal bone

  There knits a bolder one

  You cannot prick with saw,

  Nor rend with scymitar.

  Two bodies therefore be;

  Bind one, and one will flee.

  The eagle of his nest

  No easier divest

  And gain the sky,

  Than mayest thou,

  Except thyself may be

  Thine enemy;

  Captivity is consciousness,

  So's liberty.

  XXXVI.

  LOST.

  I lost a world the other day.

  Has anybody found?

  You'll know it by the row of stars

  Around its forehead bound.

  A rich man might not notice it;

  Yet to my frugal eye

  Of more esteem than ducats.

  Oh, find it, sir, for me!

  XXXVII.

  If I shouldn't be alive

  When the robins come,

  Give the one in red cravat

  A memorial crumb.

  If I couldn't thank you,

  Being just asleep,

  You will know I'm trying

  With my granite lip!

  XXXVIII.

  Sleep is supposed to be,

  By souls of sanity,

  The shutting of the eye.

  Sleep is the station grand

  Down which on either hand

  The hosts of witness stand!

  Morn is supposed to be,

  By people of degree,

  The breaking of the day.

  Morning has not occurred!

  That shall aurora be

  East of eternity;

  One with the banner gay,

  One in the red array, —

  That is the break of day.

  XXXIX.

  I shall know why, when time is over,

  And I have ceased to wonder why;

  Christ will explain each separate anguish

  In the fair schoolroom of the sky.

  He will tell me what Peter promised,

  And I, for wonder at his woe,

  I shall forget the drop of anguish

  That scalds me now, that scalds me now.

  XL.

  I never lost as much but twice,

  And that was in the sod;

  Twice have I stood a beggar

  Before the door of God!

  Angels, twice descending,

  Reimbursed my store.

  Burglar, banker, father,

  I am poor once more!

  Second Series

  II.

  I bring an unaccustomed wine

  To lips long parching, next to mine,

  And summon them to drink.

  Crackling with fever, they essay;

  I turn my brimming eyes away,

  And come next hour to look.

  The hands still hug the tardy glass;

  The lips I would have cooled, alas!

  Are so superfluous cold,

  I would as soon attempt to warm

  The bosoms where the frost has lain

  Ages beneath the mould.

  Some other thirsty there may be

  To whom this would have pointed me

  Had it remained to speak.

  And so I always bear the cup

  If, haply, mine may be the drop

  Some pilgrim thirst to slake, —

  If, haply, any say to me,

  "Unto the little, unto me,"

  When I at last awake.

  III.

  The nearest dream recedes, unrealized.

  The heaven we chase

  Like the June bee

  Before the school-boy

  Invites the race;

  Stoops to an easy clover —

  Dips — evades — teases — deploys;

  Then to the royal clouds

  Lifts his light pinnace

  Heedless of the boy

  Staring, bewildered, at the mocking sky.

  Homesick for steadfast honey,

  Ah! the bee flies not

  That brews that rare variety.

  IV.

  We play at paste,

  Till qualified for pearl,

  Then drop the paste,

  And deem ourself a fool.

  The shapes, though, were similar,

  And our new hands

  Learned gem-tactics

  Practising sands.

  V.

  I found the phrase to every thought

  I ever had, but one;

  And that defies me, — as a hand

  Did try to chalk the sun

  To races nurtured in the dark; —

  How would your own begin?

  Can blaze be do
ne in cochineal,

  Or noon in mazarin?

  VI.

  HOPE.

  Hope is the thing with feathers

  That perches in the soul,

  And sings the tune without the words,

  And never stops at all,

  And sweetest in the gale is heard;

  And sore must be the storm

  That could abash the little bird

  That kept so many warm.

  I 've heard it in the chillest land,

  And on the strangest sea;

  Yet, never, in extremity,

  It asked a crumb of me.

  VII.

  THE WHITE HEAT.

  Dare you see a soul at the white heat?

  Then crouch within the door.

  Red is the fire's common tint;

  But when the vivid ore

  Has sated flame's conditions,

  Its quivering substance plays

  Without a color but the light

  Of unanointed blaze.

  Least village boasts its blacksmith,

  Whose anvil's even din

  Stands symbol for the finer forge

  That soundless tugs within,

  Refining these impatient ores

  With hammer and with blaze,

  Until the designated light

  Repudiate the forge.

  VIII.

  TRIUMPHANT.

  Who never lost, are unprepared

  A coronet to find;

  Who never thirsted, flagons

  And cooling tamarind.

  Who never climbed the weary league —

  Can such a foot explore

  The purple territories

  On Pizarro's shore?

  How many legions overcome?

  The emperor will say.

  How many colors taken

  On Revolution Day?

  How many bullets bearest?

  The royal scar hast thou?

  Angels, write "Promoted"

  On this soldier's brow!

  IX.

  THE TEST.

  I can wade grief,

  Whole pools of it, —

  I 'm used to that.

  But the least push of joy

  Breaks up my feet,

  And I tip — drunken.

  Let no pebble smile,

  'T was the new liquor, —

  That was all!

  Power is only pain,

  Stranded, through discipline,

  Till weights will hang.

  Give balm to giants,

  And they 'll wilt, like men.