Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) was an American poet.
Nature is a haunted house--but Art--is a house that tries to be haunted.
All things do go a-courting, In earth, or sea, or air, God hath made nothing single But thee in His world so fair.
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee, -
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
I took one Draught of Life - I'll tell you what I paid - Precisely an existence - The market price, they said.
So proud she was to die It made us all ashamed That what we cherished, so unknown To her desire seemed. So satisfied to go Where none of us should be, Immediately, that anguish stooped Almost to jealousy.
Our little kinsmen after rain In plenty may be seen, a pink and pulpy multitude The tepid ground upon; A needless life if seemed to me Until a little bird As to a hospitality Advanced and breakfasted.
This is the Hour of Lead- Remembered, if outlived, As freezing persons, recollect the Snow- First-Chill-then Stupor- then the letting go---
Old age comes on suddenly, and not gradually as is thought.
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.
How odd that girl's life looks Behind this soft eclipse! I think that earth seems so To those in heaven now. This being comfort, then That other kind was pain; But why compare? I'm wife! stop there!
PHOSPHORESCENCE. Now there's a word to lift your hat to. . . to find that phosphorescence, that light within, that's the genius behind poetry.
One need not be a chamber to be haunted; One need not be a house; The brain has corridors surpassing Material place.
Love is everything. And that's all we know about it.
You are nipping in the bud fancies which I let blossom. The shore is safer, but I love to buffet the sea - I can count the bitter wrecks here in these pleasant waters, and hear the murmuring winds, but oh, I love the danger!
If fame belonged to me, I could not escape her; if she did not, the longest day would pass me on the chase, and the approbation of my dog would forsake me.
The steeples swam in amethyst, the news like squirrels swam.
There's a certain Slant of light, Winter afternoons— That oppresses, like the Heft Of Cathedral Tunes— Heavenly Hurt, it gives us— We can find no scar, But internal difference, Where the Meanings, are. . . . When it comes, the Landscape listens— Shadows—hold their breath— When it goes, 'tis like the Distance On the look of Death.
The older I grow the more do I love spring and spring flowers. Is it so with you?
The sailor cannot see the north but knows the needle can.