AMPLE make this bed. Make this bed with awe; In it wait till judgment break Excellent and fair. Be its mattress straight, Be its pillow round; Let no sunrise’ yellow noise Interrupt this ground.
Emily DickinsonHow do most people live without any thought? There are many people in the world,--you must have noticed them in the street,--how do they live? How do they get strength to put on their clothes in the morning?
Emily DickinsonI stepped from plank to plank So slow and cautiously; The stars about my head I felt, About my feet the sea. I knew not but the next Would be my final inch,— This gave me that precarious gait Some call experience.
Emily DickinsonFaith is a fine invention When gentlemen can see, But microscopes are prudent In an emergency.
Emily Dickinson'Arcturus' is his other name- I'd rather call him 'Star.' It's very mean of Science To go and interfere!
Emily DickinsonThe sun just touched the morning; The morning, happy thing, Supposed that he had come to dwell, And life would be all spring.
Emily DickinsonOne need not be a chamber to be haunted; One need not be a house; The brain has corridors surpassing Material place.
Emily DickinsonWhen he tells us about his Father, we distrust him. When he shows us his Home, we turn away, but when he confides to us that he is acquainted with grief, we listen, for that also is an acquaintance of our own.
Emily DickinsonYou are out of the way of temptation and out of the way of the tempter - I didn't mean to make you wicked - but I was - and am - and shall be - and I was with you so much that I couldn't help contaminate.
Emily DickinsonI'm Nobody! Who are you? Are you – Nobody – too? Then there's a pair of us? Don't tell! they'd advertise – you know! How dreary – to be – Somebody! How public – like a Frog – To tell one's name – the livelong June – To an admiring Bog!
Emily DickinsonUnable are the Loved to die For Love is Immortality, Nay, it is Deity - Unable they that love - to die For Love reforms Vitality Into Divinity.
Emily DickinsonAffection is like bread, unnoticed till we starve, and then we dream of it, and sing of it, and paint it, when every urchin in the street has more than he can eat.
Emily DickinsonThe Spirit lurks within the Flesh Like Tides within the Sea That make the Water live, estranged What would the Either be?
Emily DickinsonWe never know how high we are till we are called to rise. Then if we are true to form our statures touch the skies.
Emily DickinsonWhy should we censure Othello when the Criterion Lover says, "Thou shalt have no other Gods before Me"?
Emily DickinsonShe dealt her pretty words like Blades -- How glittering they shone -- And every One unbared a Nerve Or wantoned with a Bone -- She never deemed -- she hurt -- That -- is not Steel's Affair -- A vulgar grimace in the Flesh -- How ill the Creatures bear -- To Ache is human -- not polite -- The Film upon the eye Mortality's old Custom -- Just locking up -- to Die.
Emily DickinsonThe soul selects her own society, Then shuts the door; On her divine majority Obtrude no more.
Emily DickinsonI died for beauty but was scarce Adjusted in the tomb, When one who died for truth was lain In an adjoining room. He questioned softly why I failed? "For beauty," I replied. "And I for truth, the two are one; We brethren are," he said. And so, as kinsmen met a night, We talked between the rooms, Until the moss had reached our lips, And covered up our names.
Emily DickinsonI'll tell you how the sun rose, a ribbon at a time. The steeples swam in amethyst, The news like squirrels ran. The hills untied their bonnets, The bobolinks begun. Then I said softly to myself, "That must have been the sun!
Emily DickinsonWe both believe, and disbelieve a hundred times an hour, which keeps believing nimble.
Emily DickinsonI HIDE myself within my flower That wearing on your breast, You, unsuspecting, wear me too - And angels know the rest. I hide myself within my flower, That, fading from your vase, You, unsuspecting, feel for me Almost a loneliness.
Emily DickinsonHeart, we will forget him! You and I, to-night! You may forget the warmth he gave, I will forget the light. When you have done, pray tell me, That I my thoughts may dim; Haste! lest while you’re lagging, I may remember him!
Emily DickinsonA precious, mouldering pleasure 't is To meet an antique book In just the dress his century wore; A privilege, I think, His venerable hand to take, And warming in our own, A passage back, or two, to make To times when he was young. His quaint opinions to inspect, His knowledge to unfold On what concerns our mutual mind, The literature of old.
Emily DickinsonLove is like the wild rose-briar; Friendship like the holly-tree. The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms, But which will bloom most constantly? The wild rose-briar is sweet in spring ,Its summer blossoms scent the air; Yet wait till winter comes again, And who will call the wild-briar fair? Then, scorn the silly rose-wreath now, And deck thee with holly's sheen, That, when December blights thy brow, He still may leave thy garland green.
Emily DickinsonHeart, we will forget him, You and I, tonight! You must forget the warmth he gave, I will forget the light.
Emily DickinsonThe brain is wider than the sky, For, put them side by side, The one the other will include With ease, and you beside.
Emily Dickinson