61 Poems of Emily Dickinson

'Tis so much joy! 'Tis so much joy!
A light exists in spring
A precious, mouldering pleasure 'tis
A shady friend for torrid days
A word is dead
As children bid the guest good-night
As far from pity as complaint
Because I could not stop for Death
Come slowly, Eden!
Except the heaven had come so near,
For each ecstatic instant
From cocoon forth a butterfly
He ate and drank the precious words,
Heart, we will forget him!
Hope is a subtle glutton
Hope is the thing with feathers
How happy is the little stone
I bring an unaccustomed wine
I dreaded that first robin so
I had no time to hate, because
I hide myself within my flower
I like a look of agony
I never hear the word 'escape'
I noticed people disappeared
I started early, took my dog
I'm nobody! Who are you?
If I can stop one heart from breaking
Is bliss, then, such abyss
Mine enemy is growing old,
Much madness is divinest sense
My life closed twice before its close
Nature rarer uses yellow
Nature, the gentlest mother,
New feet within my garden go
No rack can torture me
Not with a club the heart is broken
On this wondrous sea
Our share of night to bear
Pain has an element of blank;
Some keep the Sabbath going to church
Some things that fly there be
Soul, wilt thou toss again?
South winds jostle them,
Success is counted sweetest
The bustle in a house
The grass so little has to do
The heart asks pleasure first
The moon was but a chin of gold
The morns are meeker than they were
The robin is the one
The sky is low, the clouds are mean
The wind tapped like a tired man
There is no frigate like a book
To fight aloud is very brave
To hear an oriole sing
To learn the transport by the pain
We learn in the retreating
When night is almost done
Who has not found the heaven below
Wild nights! Wild nights!
Within my reach!
........
Nature, the gentlest mother,
Impatient of no child,   _
The feeblest or the waywardest,
Her admonition mild
In forest and the hill   _
By traveller is heard,
Restraining rampant squirrel
Or too impetuous bird.   _
How fair her conversation,
A summer afternoon,
Her household, her assembly;   _
And when the sun goes down
Her voice among the aisles
Incites the timid prayer   _
Of the minutest cricket,
The most unworthy flower.
When all the children sleep   _
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light her lamps;
Then, bending from the sky,   _
With infinite affection
And infiniter care,
Her golden finger on her lip,   _
Wills silence everywhere.
........
New feet within my garden go,
New fingers stir the sod;   _
A troubadour upon the elm
Betrays the solitude.
New children play upon the green,   _
New weary sleep below;
And still the pensive spring returns,
And still the punctual snow!
........
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.
........
Not with a club the heart is broken,
Nor with a stone;   _
A whip, so small you could not see it,
I've known
To lash the magic creature   _
Till it fell,
Yet that whip's name too noble
Then to tell.   _
Magnanimous of bird
By boy descried,
To sing unto the stone   _
Of which it died.
Time and Eternity
........
On this wondrous sea,
Sailing silently,   _
Knowest thou the shore
Ho! pilot, ho!
Where no breakers roar,   _
Where the storm is o'er?
In the silent west
Many sails at rest,   _
Their anchors fast;
Thither I pilot thee,
Land, ho! Eternity!   _
Ashore at last!
........
Our share of night to bear,
Our share of morning,   _
Our blank in bliss to fill,
Our blank in scorning.
Here a star, and there a star,   _
Some lose their way.
Here a mist, and there a mist,
Afterwards - day!
........
Pain has an element of blank;
It cannot recollect   _
When it began, or if there were
A day when it was not.
It has no future but itself,   _
Its infinite realms contain
Its past, enlightened to perceive
New periods of pain.
........
Some keep the Sabbath going to church;
I keep it staying at home,   _
With a bobolink for a chorister,
And an orchard for a dome.
Some keep the Sabbath in surplice;   _
I just wear my wings,
And instead of tolling the bell for church,
Our little sexton sings.   _
God preaches, - a noted clergyman,
And the sermon is never long;
So instead of getting to heaven at last, I'm going all along!
........
Some things that fly there be,
Birds, hours, the bumble-bee:   _
Of these no elegy.
Some things that stay there be,
Grief, hills, eternity:   _
Nor this behooveth me.
There are, that resting, rise.
Can I expound the skies?   _
How still the riddle lies!
........
Soul, wilt thou toss again?
By just such a hazard   _
Hundreds have lost, indeed,
But tens have won an all.
Angels' breathless ballot   _
Lingers to record thee;
Imps in eager caucus
Raffle for my soul.
........
South winds jostle them,
Bumblebees come,   _
Hover, hesitate,
Drink, and are gone.
Butterflies pause   _
On their passage Cashmere;
I, softly plucking,
Present them here!
........
Success is counted sweetest
By those who ne'er succeed.   _
To comprehend a nectar
Requires sorest need.
Not one of all the purple host   _
Who took the flag to-day
Can tell the definition,
So clear, of victory,   _
As he, defeated, dying,
On whose forbidden ear
The distant strains of triumph   _
Break, agonize and clear.
........
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.
........
The grass so little has to do,
A sphere of simple green,   _
With only butterflies to brood,
And bees to entertain,
And stir all day to pretty tunes   _
The breezes fetch along,
And hold the sunshine in its lap
And bow to everything;   _
And thread the dews all night, like pearls,
And make itself so fine,
A duchess were too common   _
For such a noticing.
And even when it dies, to pass
In odors so divine,   _
As lowly spices gone to sleep,
Or amulets of pine.
And then to dwell in sovereign barns,   _
And dream the days away,
The grass so little has to do,
I wish I were a hay!
........
The heart asks pleasure first,
And then, excuse from pain;   _
And then, those little anodynes
That deaden suffering;
And then, to go to sleep;   _
And then, if it should be
The will of its Inquisitor,
The liberty to die.
........
The moon was but a chin of gold
A night or two ago,   _
And now she turns her perfect face
Upon the world below.
Her forehead is of amplest blond;   _
Her cheek like beryl stone;
Her eye unto the summer dew
The likest I have known.   _
Her lips of amber never part;
But what must be the smile
Upon her friend she could bestow   _
Were such her silver will!
And what a privilege to be
But the remotest star!   _
For certainly her way might pass
Beside your twinkling door.
Her bonnet is the firmament,   _
The universe her shoe,
The stars the trinkets at her belt,
Her dimities of blue.