Explore the most impactful and insightful quotes and sayings by Emily Dickinson, and enrich your perspective with the wisdom. Share these inspiring Emily Dickinson quotes pictures with your friends on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, or your personal blogs, completely free. Here are the top 611 Emily Dickinson quotes for you to read and share.
The reticent volcano keeps
His never slumbering plan -
Confided are his projects pink
To no precarious man. -- Emily Dickinson
VI. If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life the aching, Or cool one pain, Or help one fainting robin Unto his nest again, I shall not live in vain. -- Emily Dickinson
Afraid? Of whom am I afraid? Not death. For who is he? -- Emily Dickinson
A shady friend for torrid days Is easier to find Than one of higher temperature For frigid hour of mind. -- Emily Dickinson
After you went, a low wind warbled through the house like a spacious bird, making it high but lonely. When you had gone the love came. I supposed it would. The supper of the heart is when the guest has gone. -- Emily Dickinson
I do not know the man so bold He dare in lonely Place That awful stranger Consciousness Deliberately face-. -- Emily Dickinson
I read my sentence - steadily ... -- Emily Dickinson
'Tis sweet to know that stocks will stand When we with Daisies lie- That Commerce will continue- And Trades as briskly fly. -- Emily Dickinson
The Service without Hope
Is tenderest, I think
...
There is no Diligence like that
That knows not an Until -- Emily Dickinson
March is the month of expectation,
The things we do not know,
The Persons of Prognostication
Are coming now.
We try to sham becoming firmness,
But pompous joy
Betrays us, as his first betrothal
Betrays a boy. -- Emily Dickinson
Oh my darling one, how long you wander from me, how weary I grow of waiting and looking, and calling for you; sometimes I shut my eyes, and shut my heart towards you, and try hard to forget you because you grieve me so, but you'll never go away, oh you never will. -- Emily Dickinson
The Spirit lurks within the Flesh Like Tides within the Sea That make the Water live, estranged What would the Either be? -- Emily Dickinson
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! -- Emily Dickinson
No Life can pompless pass away -
The lowliest career
To the same Pageant wends its way
As that exalted here - -- Emily Dickinson
Fortune befriends the bold. -- Emily Dickinson
There is a Zone whose even Years
No Solstice interrupt -
Whose Sun constructs perpetual Noon
Whose perfect Seasons wait -
Whose Summer set in Summer, till
The Centuries of June
And Centuries of August cease
And Consciousness - is Noon. -- Emily Dickinson
When we think of his lone effort to live and its bleak reward, the mind turns to the myth "for His mercy endureth forever," with confiding revulsion. -- Emily Dickinson
My only sketch, profile of heaven, is a large blue sky, and larger than the biggest I have seen in June
and in it are my friends
every one of them. -- Emily Dickinson
She dwelleth in the Ground
Where Daffodils - abide
Her Maker - Her Metropolis
The Universe - Her Maid
To fetch Her Grace - and Hue
And Fairness - and Renown
The Firmament's - To Pluck Her
And fetch Her Thee - be mine - -- Emily Dickinson
A courteous, yet harrowing Grace,
As Guest, that would be gone -- Emily Dickinson
I am going to learn to make bread tomorrow. So if you may imagine me with my sleeves rolled up, mixing flour, milk, saleratus, etc., with a deal of grace. I advise you if you dont know how to make the staff of life to learn with dispatch. -- Emily Dickinson
Her Grace is all she has -
And that, so least displays -
One Art to recognize, must be,
Another Art, to praise. -- Emily Dickinson
The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience. -- Emily Dickinson
I wonder if it hurts to live, And if they have to try, And whether, could they choose between, They would not rather die. -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty crowds me till I die. -- Emily Dickinson
Her breast is fit for pearls,
But I was not a "Diver" -
Her brow is fit for thrones
But I have not a crest,
Her heart is fit for home-
I- a Sparrow- build there
Sweet of twigs and twine
My perennial nest. -- Emily Dickinson
I never saw a meme; I never saw the sea. -- Emily Dickinson
My friends are my estate. -- Emily Dickinson
Softened by Time's consummate plush,
How sleek the woe appears
That threatened childhood's citadel
And undermined the years!
Bisected now by bleaker griefs,
We envy the despair
That devastated childhood's realm,
So easy to repair. -- Emily Dickinson
I only know that when you shall come back again, the Earth will seem more beautiful, and bigger than it does now, and the blue sky from the window will be all dotted with gold
though it may not be evening, or time for the stars to come. -- Emily Dickinson
A charm invests a face Imperfectly beheld, - The lady dare not lift her veil For fear it be dispelled. But peers beyond her mesh, And wishes, and denies, - Lest interview annul a want That image satisfies. -- Emily Dickinson
Just a turn of the doorknob, and there lies freedom. -- Emily Dickinson
To travel far, there is no better ship than a book. -- Emily Dickinson
The last of Summer is Delight -
Deterred by Retrospect.
'Tis Ecstasy's revealed Review -
Enchantment's Syndicate.
To meet it - nameless as it is -
Without celestial Mail -
Audacious as without a Knock
To walk within the Veil. -- Emily Dickinson
Common sense is almost as omniscient as God. -- Emily Dickinson
I felt a Cleaving in my Mind- As if my Brain had split- I tried to match it- Seam by Seam- But could not make it fit. -- Emily Dickinson
Behavior is what a man does, not what he thinks, feels, or believes. -- Emily Dickinson
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
'Twas the New Liquor
That was all! -- Emily Dickinson
I confess that I love him, I rejoice that I love him, I thank the maker of Heaven and Earth that gave him to me. The exultation floods me. -- Emily Dickinson
To possess is past the instant; we achieve the joy, immortality contented, were anomaly. -- Emily Dickinson
A Clock stopped
Not the Mantel's
Geneva's farthest skill
Can't put the puppet bowing
That just now dangled still -- Emily Dickinson
I started early, took my dog, And visited the sea; The mermaids in the basement Came out to look at me -- Emily Dickinson
Superiority to fate
Is difficult to learn.
'Tis not conferred by any,
But possible to earn
A pittance at a time,
Until, to her surprise,
The soul with strict economy
Subsists till Paradise. -- Emily Dickinson
I tell her we all shall fly so soon, not to let it grieve her, and what indeed is Earth but a Nest, from whose rim we are all falling? -- Emily Dickinson
I know some lonely houses off the road
A robber'd like the look of,
Wooden barred,
And windows hanging low -- Emily Dickinson
Anger as soon as fed is dead-
'Tis starving makes it fat. -- Emily Dickinson
Such is the force of Happiness
The Least can lift a ton Assisted by its stimulus. -- Emily Dickinson
Lips unused to thee, Bashful, sip thy jasmines, As the fainting bee, Reaching late his flower, Round her chamber hums, Counts his nectars - enters, And is lost in balms! -- Emily Dickinson
I have a Bird in spring
Which for myself doth sing -
The spring decoys.
And as the summer nears -
And as the Rose appears,
Robin is gone.
Yet do I not repine
Knowing that Bird of mine
Though flown -
Learneth beyond the sea
Melody new for me
And will return. -- Emily Dickinson
The pedigree of honey does not concern the bee; A clover, any time, to him is aristocracy. -- Emily Dickinson
We grow accustomed to the dark when light is put away
-- Emily Dickinson
The smitten rock that gushes, The trampled steel that springs; A cheek is always redder Just where the hectic stings! -- Emily Dickinson
She died
this was the way she died;
And when her breath was done,
Took up her simple wardrobe
And started for the sun.
Her little figure at the gate
The angels must have spied,
Since I could never find her
Upon the mortal side. -- Emily Dickinson
They dropped like flakes, they dropped like stars,
Like petals from a rose,
When suddenly across the lune
A wind with fingers goes.
They perished in the seamless grass,
No eye could find the place;
But God on his repealless list
Can summon every face -- Emily Dickinson
Estranged from Beauty - none can be -
For Beauty is Infinity -
And power to be finite ceased
Before Identity was leased. -- Emily Dickinson
A Bayonet's contrition is nothing to the dead. -- Emily Dickinson
Eden is that old-fashioned house we dwell in every day Without suspecting our abode until we drive away. -- Emily Dickinson
I held a jewel in my fingers And went to sleep. The day was warm, and winds were prosy; I said: "'T will keep." I woke and chid my honest fingers, - The gem was gone; And now an amethyst remembrance Is all I own. -- Emily Dickinson
How glad I am that spring has come, and how it calms my mind when wearied with study to walk out in the green fields and beside the pleasant streams in which South Hadley is rich! ... The older I grow, the more do I love spring and spring flowers. Is it not so with you? (May 16, 1848 to Abiah Root) -- Emily Dickinson
Though it may never come again is what makes it so sweet. -- Emily Dickinson
How lucious lies the pea within the pod. -- Emily Dickinson
To shut your eyes is to travel. -- Emily Dickinson
When Jesus 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 Dickinson
How vain it seems to write, when one knows how to feel
how much more near and dear to sit beside you, talk with you, hear the tones of your voice ... Give me strength, Susie, write me of hope and love, and of hearts that endure ... -- Emily Dickinson
The second half of joy is shorter than the first -- Emily Dickinson
Inebriate of Air - am I
And Debauchee of Dew
Reeling - thro endless summer days
From Inns of Molten Blue - -- Emily Dickinson
So instead of getting to Heaven, at last - I'm going, all along. -- Emily Dickinson
Down Time's quaint stream
Without an oar
We are enforced to sail
Our Port a secret
Our Perchance a Gale
What Skipper would
Incur the Risk
What Buccaneer would ride
Without a surety from the Wind
Or schedule of the Tide -- Emily Dickinson
Within thy Grave! Oh no, but on some other flight - Thou only camest to mankind To rend it with Good night -- Emily Dickinson
Then I will not repine
Knowing that bird of mine
Though flown shall in a distant tree
Bright melody for me
Return. -- Emily Dickinson
Hope is a strange invention - A Patent of the Heart - In unremitting action Yet never wearing out -- Emily Dickinson
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 Dickinson
Forever is comprised of nows. -- Emily Dickinson
BEQUEST. You left me, sweet, two legacies, - A legacy of love A Heavenly Father would content, Had He the offer of; You left me boundaries of pain Capacious as the sea, Between eternity and time, Your consciousness and me. -- Emily Dickinson
There is a solitude of space.
A solitude of sea. A solitude of death, but these societies shall be compared with that profounder site-that polar privacy. A soul admitted to itself
Finite infinity. -- Emily Dickinson
Tell all the Truth but tell it slant
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind
-- Emily Dickinson
But it is growing damp and I must go in. Memory's fog is rising. -- Emily Dickinson
Heaven is so far of the mind that were the mind dissolved - the site of it by architect could not again be proved. -- Emily Dickinson
Nothing more do I ask than to share with you the ecstasy and sacrament of my life. -- Emily Dickinson
Portrait The world spreads out on either side no farther than the heart is wide. -- Emily Dickinson
The Brain is just the weight of God
For
Heft them
Pound for Pound
And they will differ
if they do
As Syllable from Sound -- Emily Dickinson
I took my Power in my Hand
And went against the World
'Twas not so much as David
had
But I
was twice as bold
I aimed by Pebble
but Myself Was all the one that fell
Was it Goliath
was too large
Or was myself
too small? -- Emily Dickinson
We trust in plumed procession
For such the angels go
Rank after rank, with even feet/And uniforms of snow. -- Emily Dickinson
Earth is a merry damsel, and heaven a knight so true -- Emily Dickinson
Could you tell me how to grow
or is it unconveyed
like Melody
or Witchcraft? -- Emily Dickinson
That I did always love, I bring thee proof: That till I loved I did not love enough. That I shall love alway, I offer thee That love is life, And life hath immortality. This, dost thou doubt, sweet? Then have I Nothing to show But Calvary. -- Emily Dickinson
Bind me-I still can sing-
Banish-my mandolin
Strikes true within-
Slay-and my Soul shall rise
Chanting to Paradise-
Still thine. -- Emily Dickinson
There are, that resting, rise.
Can I expound the skies?
How still the riddle lies! -- Emily Dickinson
How frugal is the chariot that bears a human soul. -- Emily Dickinson
I have no life but this,
To lead it here;
Nor any death, but lest
Dispelled from there;
Nor tie to earths to come,
Nor action new,
Except through this extent,
The realm of you. -- Emily Dickinson
You'll find it-when you try to die- The Easier to let go- For recollecting such as went- You could not spare-you know. -- Emily Dickinson
The brain within its groove Runs evenly and true; But let a splinter swerve, 'T were easier for you To put the water back When floods have slit the hills, And scooped a turnpike for themselves, And blotted out the mills! -- Emily Dickinson
Life is but Life! And Death, but Death!
Bliss is but Bliss, and Breath but Breath! -- Emily Dickinson
If you were coming in the fall,
I'd brush the summer by,
With half a smile and half a spurn,
As housewives do a fly.
If I could see you in a year,
I'd wind the months in balls,
And put them each in separate drawers,
Until their time befalls. -- Emily Dickinson
Now, when I read, I read not,
For interrupting tears
Obliterate the etchings
Too costly for repairs. -- Emily Dickinson
The dying need but little, dear, - A glass of water's all, A flower's unobtrusive face To punctuate the wall, A fan, perhaps, a friend's regret, And certainly that one No color in the rainbow Perceives when you are gone. -- Emily Dickinson
To lose what we never owned might seem an eccentric Bereavement but Presumption has its Affliction as actually as Claim
-- Emily Dickinson
My dying tutor told me that he would like to live till I had been a poet, but Death was much of Mob as I could master-then-And when far afterward-a sudden light on Orchards, or a new fashion in the wind troubled my attention- I felt a palsy, here- the Verses just relieve- (174) -- Emily Dickinson
Sweet hour, blessed hour, to carry me to you, and to bring you back to me, long enough to snatch one kiss, and whisper goodbye again. -- Emily Dickinson
Bless God, he went as soldiers,
His musket on his breast
Grant God, he charge the bravest
Of all the martial blest!
Please God, might I behold him
In epauletted white
I should not fear the foe then
I should not fear the fight! -- Emily Dickinson
When a Lover is a Beggar Abject is his Knee. When a Lover is an Owner Different is he ... -- Emily Dickinson
November always seemed to me the Norway of the year. -- Emily Dickinson
Not to discover weakness is The Artifice of strength. -- Emily Dickinson
The small heart cannot break. The ecstasy of its penalty solaces the large. -- Emily Dickinson
Opinion is a flitting thing
But Truth outlasts the Sun. -- Emily Dickinson
Affection 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 Dickinson
To fight aloud is very brave, But gallanter, I know, Who charge within the bosom, The cavalry of woe. -- Emily Dickinson
Spring's first conviction is a wealth beyond its whole experience. -- Emily Dickinson
Where Thou art - that - is Home. -- Emily Dickinson
Sisters are brittle things. God was penurious with me, which makes me shrewd with Him. One is a dainty sum! One bird, one cage, one flight; one song in those far woods, as yet suspected by faith only! -- Emily Dickinson
God gave a loaf to every bird, But just a crumb to me. -- Emily Dickinson
Harm is one of those things that I always mean to keep clear of, but somehow my intentions and me don't chime as they ought, and people will get hit with stones that I throw at my neighbor's dogs ... -- Emily Dickinson
I would have drowned twice to save you sinking, dear. -- Emily Dickinson
When everything that ticked has stopped, and space stares, all around, or grisly frosts, first autumn morns, repeal the beating ground. -- Emily Dickinson
Truth is such a rare thing it is delightful to tell it, -- Emily Dickinson
Apparently with no surprise To any happy Flower The Frost beheads it at its play
In accidental power
The blonde Assassin passes on
The Sun proceeds unmoved To measure off another Day For an Approving God. -- Emily Dickinson
Let me not mar that perfect dream
By an auroral stain,
But so adjust my daily night
That it will come again. -- Emily Dickinson
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words
And never stops at all. -- Emily Dickinson
Hope is the thing with feathers -- Emily Dickinson
Hope is a thing with feathers... -- Emily Dickinson
A Letter is a Joy of Earth - It is denied the Gods -- Emily Dickinson
Dying is a wild night and a new road. -- Emily Dickinson
Behold this little Bane- The Boon of all alive- As common as it is unknown The name of it is Love. -- Emily Dickinson
Spring is the Period
Express from God.
Among the other seasons
Himself abide,
But during March and April
None stir abroad
Without a cordial interview
With God. -- Emily Dickinson
Have you got a brook in your little heart, Where bashful flowers blow, And blushing birds go down to drink, And shadows tremble so? -- Emily Dickinson
The Life we have is very great.
The Life that we shall see
Surpasses it, we know, because
It is Infinity,
But when all Space has been beheld
And all Dominion shown
The smallest Human Heart's extent
Reduces it to none. -- Emily Dickinson
I've got a Tomahawk in my side but that don't hurt me much. -- Emily Dickinson
I had no time to hate, because The grave would hinder me, And life was not so ample I Could finish enmity. -- Emily Dickinson
The Heart wants what it wants - or else it does not care -- Emily Dickinson
I cling to nowhere until I fall - the crash of Nothing ... -- Emily Dickinson
Love is everything. And that's all we know about it. -- Emily Dickinson
And then
a Day as huge
As Yesterdays in pairs,
Unrolled its horror in my face
Until it blocked my eyes -- Emily Dickinson
Much Madness is Divinest Sense, to a Discerning Eye ... -- Emily Dickinson
And then I heard them lift a box, And creak across my soul With those same boots of lead, again, Then space began to toll. -- Emily Dickinson
I need you more and more, and the great world grows wider, and dear ones fewer and fewer, every day that you stay away
-- Emily Dickinson
To see her is a picture-
To hear her is a tune-
To know her an Intemperance
As innocent as June-
To know her not-Affliction-
To own her for a Friend
A warmth as near as if the the Sun
Were shining in your Hand. -- Emily Dickinson
I have a brother and sister; my mother does not care for thought, and father, too busy with his briefs to notice what we do. He buys me many books, but begs me not to read them, because he fears they joggle the mind. -- Emily Dickinson
Good times are always mutual; that is what makes good times. -- Emily Dickinson
Much Madness Is Divinest Sense
Much Madness is divinest Sense
To a discerning Eye
Much Sense - the starkest Madness
'Tis the Majority
In this, as All, prevail
Assent - and you are sane
Demur - you're straightway dangerous
And handled with a Chain - -- Emily Dickinson
Truth is so rare that it is delightful to tell it. -- Emily Dickinson
Safe Despair it is that raves- Agony is frugal. Puts itself severe away For its own perusal. -- Emily Dickinson
To lose what we have never owned might seem an eccentric bereavement, but Presumption has its own affliction as well as claim. -- Emily Dickinson
You cannot put a fire out! A thing that can ignite can go itself- without a flame- E'en through the darkest night! -- Emily Dickinson
The heart asks pleasure first, And then, excuse from pain. -- Emily Dickinson
I am one of the lingering bad ones, and so do I slink away, and pause, and ponder, and ponder, and pause, and do work without knowing why - not surely for this brief world, and more sure it is not for heaven - and I ask what this message of Christ means. -- Emily Dickinson
So we must keep apart, You there, I here, With just the door ajar -- Emily Dickinson
And I, could I stand by
And see you freeze,
Without my right of frost,
Death's privilege? -- Emily Dickinson
For you know we do not mind our dress
When we are going home -- Emily Dickinson
And you dropt, lost,
When something broke
And let you from a Dream -- Emily Dickinson
I was almost persuaded to be a Christian. I thought I never again could be thoughtless and worldly. But I soon forgot my morning prayer or else it was irksome to me. One by one my old habits returned and I cared less for religion than ever. -- Emily Dickinson
I never spoke - unless addressed
And then, 'twas brief and low
I could not bear to live - aloud
The Racket shamed me so
And if it had not been so far
And any one I knew
Were going - I had often thought
How noteless - I could die - -- Emily Dickinson
In such a porcelain life, one likes to be sure that all is well lest one stumble upon one's hopes in a pile of broken crockery. -- Emily Dickinson
I do not feel I could give up all for Christ, were I called to die. -- Emily Dickinson
How happy is the little stone That rambles in the road alone, And doesn't care about careers, And exigencies never fears; Whose coat of elemental brown A passing universe put on; And independent as the sun, Associates or glows alone, Fulfilling absolute decree In casual simplicity. -- Emily Dickinson
You will forgive me, for I never visit. I am from the fields, you know, and while quite at home with the Dandelion, make but sorry figure in a Drawing
room
Did you ask me out with a bunch of Daisies, I should thank you, and accept
-- Emily Dickinson
It's all i have to bring today
this and my heart beside
this and my heart and all the fields
and all the meadows wide
be sure to count
should i forget
someone the sum could tell
this and my heart and all the bees
which in the clovers dwell -- Emily Dickinson
His Labor is a Chant - His Idleness -a Tune - Oh, for a Bee's experience Of Clovers, and of Noon! -- Emily Dickinson
After a hundred years
Nobody knows the place,
Agony, that enacted there,
Motionless as peace. -- Emily Dickinson
Heavenly Father - take to thee The supreme iniquity Fashioned by thy candid Hand In a moment contraband - Though to trust us seem to us More respectful - We are Dust - We apologize to thee For thine own Duplicity. -- Emily Dickinson
There is a pain so utter, it swallows being up;
The covers the abyss with a trance
So memory can step around, across, upon it. -- Emily Dickinson
Not 'Revelation'-'tis that waits/ But our unfurnished eyes -- Emily Dickinson
The minister today preached about death and judgment, and what would become of those who behaved improperly - and somehow it scared me. He preached such an awful sermon I didn't think I should ever see you again until the Judgment Day. The subject of perdition seemed to please him somehow. -- Emily Dickinson
Love can do all but raise the Dead I doubt if even that From such a giant were withheld Were flesh equivalent But love is tired and must sleep, And hungry and must graze And so abets the shining Fleet Till it is out of gaze. -- Emily Dickinson
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 then. My barefoot rank is better. -- Emily Dickinson
Tie the strings to my life, my Lord, Then I am ready to go! Just a look at the horses - Rapid! That will do! Put me in on the firmest side, So I shall never fall; For we must ride to the Judgment, And it's partly down hill. -- Emily Dickinson
That no Flake of [snow] fall on you or them - is a wish that would be a Prayer, were Emily not a Pagan. -- Emily Dickinson
They're here, though; not a creature failed,
No blossom stayed away
In gentle deference to me,
The Queen of Calvary. -- Emily Dickinson
I 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 Dickinson
Mirth is the Mail of Anguish -- -- Emily Dickinson
Does not Eternity appear dreadful to you. I often get to thinking of it and it seems so dark to me that I almost wish there was no Eternity. To think that we must forever live and never cease to be. It seems as if Death would be a relief to so endless a state of existence. -- Emily Dickinson
TO my quick ear the leaves conferred;
The bushes they were bells;
I could not find a privacy
From Nature's sentinels.
In cave if I presumed to hide,
The walls began to tell;
Creation seemed a mighty crack
To make me visible. -- Emily Dickinson
The Crime, from us, is hidden, [though] he is presumed to know. -- Emily Dickinson
God's little Blond Blessing we have long deemed you, and hope his so-called Will will not compel him to revoke you. -- Emily Dickinson
Till it has loved, no man or woman can become itself. -- Emily Dickinson
Time is short and full, like an outgrown Frock - . -- Emily Dickinson
A light exists in Spring
Not present in the year
at any other period
When March is scarcely here. -- Emily Dickinson
The abdication of Belief
Makes the Behavior small-
Better an ignis fatuus
Than no illume at all. -- Emily Dickinson
Who never lost, are unprepared -- Emily Dickinson
Proud of my broken heart since thou didst break it,
Proud of the pain I did not feel till thee,
Proud of my night since thou with moons dost slake it,
Not to partake thy passion, my humility. -- Emily Dickinson
A precious, mouldering pleasure 't is
To meet an antique book,
In just the dress his century wore;
A privilege, I think. -- Emily Dickinson
THE soul should always stand ajar,
That if the heaven inquire,
He will not be obliged to wait,
Or shy of troubling her.
Depart, before the host has slid
The bolt upon the door,
To seek for the accomplished guest,
Her visitor no more. -- Emily Dickinson
I work to drive the awe away, yet awe impels the work. -- Emily Dickinson
A death-blow is a life-blow to some Who, till they died, did not alive become; Who, had they lived, had died, but when They died, vitality begun. -- Emily Dickinson
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 a chart were given. -- Emily Dickinson
The only Commandment I ever obeyed - 'Consider the Lilies. -- Emily Dickinson
Till I loved I never liked enough. -- Emily Dickinson
XVI. Surgeons must be very careful When they take the knife! Underneath their fine incisions Stirs the culprit, - Life! -- Emily Dickinson
This was in the white of the year,
That was in the green,
Drifts were as difficult then to think
As daisies now to be seen.
Looking back is best that is left,
Or if it be before,
Retrospection is prospect's half,
Sometimes almost more. -- Emily Dickinson
Knew I how to pray, to intercede for your [broken] Foot were intuitive - but I am but a Pagan. -- Emily Dickinson
The older I grow the more do I love spring and spring flowers. Is it so with you? -- Emily Dickinson
What Soft
Cherubic Creatures
These Gentlewomen are
One would as soon assault a Plush
Or violate a Star -- Emily Dickinson
They say that 'home is where the heart is.' I think it is where the house is, and the adjacent buildings. -- Emily Dickinson
If I wasn't a perfect woman, I'd bust you in the nose. -- Emily Dickinson
Dare you see a Soul at the White Heat? -- Emily Dickinson
Water, is taught by thirst. -- Emily Dickinson
I tasted - careless - then -
I did not know the Wine
Came once a World - Did you?
Oh, had you told me so -
This Thirst would blister - easier - now -- Emily Dickinson
I miss the grasshoppers much, but suppose it is all for the best. I should become too much attached to a trotting world. -- Emily Dickinson
God, keep me from what they call 'households,' -- Emily Dickinson
Fearless
the cobweb swings from the ceiling
Indolent Housewife
in Daisies
lain! -- Emily Dickinson
A Word that Breathes Distinctly
Has not the Power to Die -- Emily Dickinson
Love is done when Loves begun, Sages say, But have Sages known? -- Emily Dickinson
Fame is a fickle food upon a shifting plate. -- Emily Dickinson
A soft Sea washed around the House A Sea of Summer Air And rose and fell the magic Planks That sailed without a care - For Captain was the Butterfly For Helmsman was the Bee And an entire universe For the delighted crew. -- Emily Dickinson
Pain - has an Element of Blank
It cannot recollect
When it begun - or if there were
a time when it was not -
It has no Future - but itself -
Its Infinite contain
Its Past - enlightened to perceive
New Periods - of Pain. -- Emily Dickinson
My friends are my estate. Forgive me then the avarice to hoard them. They tell me those who were poor early have different views of gold. I don't know how that is. God is not so wary as we, else He would give us no friends, lest we forget Him. -- Emily Dickinson
Unto a broken heart No other one may go Without the high prerogative Itself hath suffered too. -- Emily Dickinson
The Morning after Woe- Tis frequently the Way- Surpasses all that rose before- For utter Jubilee-. -- Emily Dickinson
I'll tell you how the Sun rose. -- Emily Dickinson
She rose to his requirement, dropped The playthings of her life To take the honorable work Of woman and of wife. -- Emily Dickinson
I'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 Dickinson
To be alive is power; existence in itself; without a further function; omnipotence. -- Emily Dickinson
His mind of man, a secret makes I meet him with a start he carries a circumference in which I have no part. -- Emily Dickinson
I am nobody! Who are you? Are you a nobody, too? -- Emily Dickinson
A Deed knocks first at Thought And then - it knocks at Will - That is the manufacturing spot. -- Emily Dickinson
Take all away from me, but leave me Ecstasy, And I am richer then than all my Fellow Men-. -- Emily Dickinson
You cannot fold a flood and put it in a drawer, because the winds would find it out and tell your cedar floor. -- Emily Dickinson
Victory comes late
And is held low to freezing lips
Too rapt with frost
To take it -- Emily Dickinson
I hope you're very careful working, eating and drinking when the heat is so great
there are temptations there which at home you are free from
beware the juicy fruits, and the cooling ades, and cordials, and do not eat ice-cream, it is so very dangerous. -- Emily Dickinson
My life closed twice before its close -- Emily Dickinson
How 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 Dickinson
To pity those that know her not
Is helped by the regret
That those who know her, know her less
The nearer her they get. -- Emily Dickinson
Two Seasons, it is said, exist-
The Summer of the Just,
And this of Ours, diversified
With Prospect, and with Frost-
May not our Second with its First
So infinite compare
That We but recollect the one
The other to prefer? -- Emily Dickinson
In a serener Bright,
In a more golden light
I see
Each little doubt and fear,
each little discord here
Removed. -- Emily Dickinson
Renunciation-is a piercing Virtue-The letting go A Presence-for an Expectation-. -- Emily Dickinson
Eternity' is there, We say, as of a station. Meanwhile, he is so near, He joins me in my Ramble? Divides abode with me? No Friend have I that so persists As this Eternity. -- Emily Dickinson
But a Book is only the Heart's Portrait- every Page a Pulse. -- Emily Dickinson
They shut me up in Prose - / As when a little Girl / They put me in the Closet - / Because they liked me "still" - -- Emily Dickinson
Looking at Death, is Dying - ... -- Emily Dickinson
A wounded deer leaps the highest -- Emily Dickinson
I 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 Dickinson
I am very busy picking up stems and stamens as the hollyhocks leave their clothes around. -- Emily Dickinson
What will the solemn Hemlock- What will the Oak tree say? -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty is not the cause of something, it is what it is. -- Emily Dickinson
The Truth never flaunted a sign. -- Emily Dickinson
What are you reading now? I have little time to read when I am here, but while at home I had a feast in the reading line, I can assure you ... Am not I a pendant for telling you what I have been reading? (May 16, 1848 to Abiah Root) -- Emily Dickinson
Consciousness is the only home of which we know. -- Emily Dickinson
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? -- Emily Dickinson
Best Witchcraft is Geometry
To the magician's mind -
His ordinary acts are feats
To thinking of mankind. -- Emily Dickinson
Is Bliss then, such Abyss, I must not put my foot amiss For fear I spoil my shoe? I'd rather suit my foot Than save my Boot
For yet to buy another Pair is possible, At any store
But Bliss, is sold just once. The Patent lost None buy it any more
-- Emily Dickinson
I had no monarch in my life, and cannot rule myself; and when I try to organize, my little force explodes and leaves me bare and charred. -- Emily Dickinson
The Pleading of the Summer - That other Prank - of Snow - That Cushions Mystery with Tulle, For fear the Squirrels - know. -- Emily Dickinson
Pardon My Sanity In A World Insane -- Emily Dickinson
A letter always seemed to me like immortality because it is the mind alone without corporeal friend. -- Emily Dickinson
Find ecstasy in life; the mere sense of living is joy enough. -- Emily Dickinson
Our journey had advanced; Our feet were almost come To that odd fork in Being's road, Eternity by term. -- Emily Dickinson
The sun just touched the morning;
The morning, happy thing,
Supposed that he had come to dwell,
And life would be all spring. -- Emily Dickinson
Sweet Skepticism of the Heart That knows and does not know And tosses like a Fleet of Balm Affronted by the snow. -- Emily Dickinson
Remorse is cureless
the Disease
Not even God
can heal
For 'tis His institution
and
The Adequate of Hell -- Emily Dickinson
I cannot help esteem The 'Bird within the Hand' Superior to the one The 'Bush' may yield me Or may not Too late to choose again -- Emily Dickinson
The friend anguish reveals is the slowest forgot. -- Emily Dickinson
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! -- Emily Dickinson
The Overtakelessness of Those
Who have accomplished Death -
Majestic is to me beyond
The majesties of Earth -
The Soul her "Not at Home"
Inscribes upon the Flesh -
And takes a fine aerial gait
Beyond the Writ of Touch. -- Emily Dickinson
My love for those I love
not many
not very many, but don't I love them so? -- Emily Dickinson
I don't profess to be profound; but I do lay claim to common sense. -- Emily Dickinson
In a Life that
stopped guessing,
you and I should
not feel at home -- Emily Dickinson
The worm doth woo the mortal, death claims a living bride,
Night unto day is married, morn unto eventide,
Earth a merry damsel, and heaven a knight so true,
And Earth is quite coquettish, and beseemeth in vain to sue. -- Emily Dickinson
Since then 'tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity. -- Emily Dickinson
The will is always near, dear, though the feet vary. -- Emily Dickinson
Life is a spell so exquisite that everything conspires to break it. -- Emily Dickinson
I would paint a portrait which would bring the tears, had I canvas for it, and the scene should be
solitude, and the figures
solitude
and the lights and shades, each a solitude. -- Emily Dickinson
I had no portrait, now, but am small, like the wren; and my hair is bold, like the chestnut bur; and my eyes, like the sherry in the glass, that the guest leaves. -- Emily Dickinson
If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain. -- Emily Dickinson
To venerate the simple days Which lead the seasons by, Needs but to remember That from you or I They may take the trifle Termed mortality! -- Emily Dickinson
If Aims impel these Astral Ones The ones allowed to know Know that which makes them as forgot As Dawn forgets them now -- Emily Dickinson
The steeples swam in amethyst, the news like squirrels swam. -- Emily Dickinson
It is easy to work when the soul is at play. -- Emily Dickinson
I many times thought peace had come,
When peace was far away;
As wrecked men deem they sight the land
At centre of the sea,
And struggle slacker, but to prove,
As hopelessly as I,
How many the fictitious shores
Before the harbor lie. -- Emily Dickinson
Then, as horizons step,
Or noons report away,
Without the formula of sound,
It passes, and we stay:
A quality of loss
Affecting our content. -- Emily Dickinson
Faith slips - and laughs, and rallies -- Emily Dickinson
If I shouldn't be alive
When the Robins come,
Give the one in Red Cravat,
A Memorial crumb. -- Emily Dickinson
I sing to use the Waiting
My bonnet but to tie,
And close the door unto my house
No more to do have I
'Till his best step approaching,
We journey to the day,
And tell each other how we sung
To keep the dark away. -- Emily Dickinson
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil. -- Emily Dickinson
Longing is like a seed that wrestles in the ground -- Emily Dickinson
Finite to fail, but infinite to venture. -- Emily Dickinson
If you saw a bullet
hit a Bird - and he told you
he wasn't shot - you might weep
at his courtesy, but you would
certainly doubt his word -
One drop more from the gash
that stains your Daisy's
bosom - then would you believe? -- Emily Dickinson
The dandelion's pallid tube
Astonishes the grass,
And winter instantly becomes
An infinite alas. -- Emily Dickinson
Success is counted sweetest
by those who ne'er succeed
The comprehend a nectar
requires sorest need -- Emily Dickinson
Initial of Creation, and The Exponent of Earth -- Emily Dickinson
What fortitude the Soul contains, That it can so endure The accent of a coming Foot- The opening of a Door. -- Emily Dickinson
People need hard times and oppression to develop psychic muscles. -- Emily Dickinson
Did the harebell loose her girdle
To the lover bee,
Would the bee the harebell hallow
Much as formerly? -- Emily Dickinson
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! -- Emily Dickinson
The Poets light but Lamps-
Themselves-go out- -- Emily Dickinson
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! -- Emily Dickinson
They say that "Time assuages" -
Time never did assuage -
An actual suffering strengthens
As Sinews do, with age -
Time is a Test of Trouble -
But not a Remedy -
If such it prove, it prove too
There was no Malady -- Emily Dickinson
I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there 's a pair of us - don't tell!
They 'd banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog! -- Emily Dickinson
In the name of the bee And of the butterfly And of the breeze, amen! -- Emily Dickinson
Faith is a fine invention
When gentlemen can see,
But microscopes are prudent
In an emergency. -- Emily Dickinson
God is not so wary as we, else He would give us no friends, lest we forget Him! The charms of the heaven in the bush are superseded, I fear, by the heaven in the hand, occasionally. -- Emily Dickinson
So from the mould
Scarlet and Gold
Many a Bulb will rise --
Hidden away, cunningly,
From sagacious eyes.
So from Cocoon
Many a Worm
Leap so Highland gay,
Peasants like me --
Peasants like Thee,
Gaze perplexedly! -- Emily Dickinson
At least to pray is left - is left Oh Jesus - in the Air - I know not which thy chamber is - I'm knocking everywhere. -- Emily Dickinson
Who has not found the heaven below
Will fail of it above.
God's residence is next to min,
His furniture is love. -- Emily Dickinson
If you take care of the small things, the big things take care of themselves. You can gain more control over your life by paying closer attention to the little things. -- Emily Dickinson
If the stillness is Volcanic
In the human face
When upon a pain Titanic
Features keep their place-
If at length the smoldering anguish
Will not overcome-
And the palpitating Vinyard
In the dust, be overthrown? -- Emily Dickinson
I could not stop for death and he did not stop for me. -- Emily Dickinson
Not if Their Party were waiting,
Not if to talk with Me
Were to Them now, Homesickness
After Eternity. -- Emily Dickinson
Experiment has a stimulus which withers its fear. -- Emily Dickinson
To multiply the harbors does not reduce the sea. -- Emily Dickinson
Until you have loved, you cannot become yourself. -- Emily Dickinson
September's Baccalaureate A combination is Of Crickets - Crows - and Retrospects And a dissembling Breeze That hints without assuming - An Innuendo sear That makes the Heart put up its Fun And turn Philosopher. -- Emily Dickinson
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 -- Emily Dickinson
The truth dazzles gradually, or else the world would be blind. -- Emily Dickinson
When I sound the fairy call, gather here in silent meeting,
Chin to knee on the orchard wall, cooled with dew and cherries eating.
Merry, merry, take a cherry, mine are sounder, mine are rounder,
Mine are sweeter for the eater, when the dews fall, and you'll be fairies all. -- Emily Dickinson
When I lost the use of my Eyes it was a comfort to think there were so few real books that I could easily find some one to read me all of them. -- Emily Dickinson
Forgive me if I never visit. I am from the fields, you know, and while quite at home with the dandelions, make a sorry figure in a drawing room. -- Emily Dickinson
Angels in the early morning may be seen the dews among. Stooping, plucking, smiling, flying. Do the buds to them belong? -- Emily Dickinson
Witchcraft was hung, in History,
But History and I
Find all the Witchcraft that we need
Around us, every Day - -- Emily Dickinson
A power of Butterfly must be - The Aptitude to fly Meadows of Majesty concedes And easy Sweeps of Sky - -- Emily Dickinson
They might not need me; but they might. I'll let my head be just in sight; a smile as small as mine might be precisely their necessity. -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty crowds me till I die." Emily Dickinson -- Emily Dickinson
You can stay young as long as you learn. -- Emily Dickinson
Opinion is a flitting thing, but the truth outlasts the sun. -- Emily Dickinson
Water is taught by thirst;
Land, by the oceans passed;
Transport, by throe;
Peace, by its battles told;
Love, by memorial mould;
Birds, by the snow. -- Emily Dickinson
This quiet Dust was Gentlemen and Ladies,
And Lads and Girls;
Was laughter and ability and sighing,
And frocks and curls.
This passive place a Summer's nimble mansion,
Where Bloom and Bees
Fulfilled their Oriental Circuit,
Then ceased like these. -- Emily Dickinson
The words the happy say Are paltry melody But those the silent feel Are beautiful-. -- Emily Dickinson
All but Death, can be Adjusted -
Dynasties repaired -
Systems - settled in their Sockets -
Citadels dissolved . . . -- Emily Dickinson
Parting is all we know of heaven and all we need of hell. -- Emily Dickinson
Death is the common right Of toads and men, - Of earl and midge The privilege. Why swagger then? The gnat's supremacy Is large as thine. -- Emily Dickinson
Just girt me for the onset with Eternity,
When breath blew back,
And on the other side
I heard recede the disappointed tide! -- Emily Dickinson
The distance that the dead have gone Does not at first appear- Their coming back seems possible For many an ardent year. -- Emily Dickinson
I notice where Death has been introduced, he frequently calls, making it desirable to forestall his advances. -- Emily Dickinson
Death is a supple suitor, that wins at last. It is a stealthy wooing; conducted first by pallid innuendos and dim approach, but brave at last with bugles. -- Emily Dickinson
Suspense-is Hostiler than Death-Death- tho soever Broad, Is just Death, and cannot increase- Suspense-does not conclude-. -- Emily Dickinson
That short, potential stir That each can make but once, That bustle so illustrious Tis almost consequence, Is the eclat of death. -- Emily Dickinson
A Toad, can die of Light - Death is the Common Right Of Toads and Men -- Emily Dickinson
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. -- Emily Dickinson
Life is death we're lengthy at -- Emily Dickinson
Love is anterior to life, posterior to death, initial of creation, and the exponent of breath. -- Emily Dickinson
Those who lift their hats shall see Nature as devout do God. -- Emily Dickinson
Eternity, Presumption
The instant I perceive
That you who were Existence
Yourself forgot to live -- Emily Dickinson
There is nothing more fugal than a book
to take you to different lands -- Emily Dickinson
Vinnie rocks her Garden and moans that God won't help her. I suppose he is too busy getting angry with the Wicked every day. -- Emily Dickinson
I could not prove the Years had feet-/Yet confident they run. -- Emily Dickinson
Publication - is the auction of the mind ... -- Emily Dickinson
Had we less to say to those we love, perhaps we should say it oftener. -- Emily Dickinson
We both believe, and disbelieve a hundred times an hour, which keeps believing nimble. -- Emily Dickinson
In snow thou comest
Thou shalt go with resuming ground
The sweet derision of thx crow
And Glee's advancing sound -- Emily Dickinson
What inn is this
Where for the night
Peculiar traveller comes?
Who is the landlord?
Where are the maids?
Behold, what curious rooms!
No ruddy fires on the hearth,
No brimming tankards flow.
Necromancer, landlord,
Who are these below? -- Emily Dickinson
Memory is a strange Bell - Jubilee, and Knell. -- Emily Dickinson
How strange that nature does not knock, and yet does not intrude! -- Emily Dickinson
Endow the Living - with the Tears - You squander on the Dead. -- Emily Dickinson
A wounded dear leaps the highest -- Emily Dickinson
A heaven in a gaze,
A heaven of heavens, the privilege
Of one another's eyes. -- Emily Dickinson
But are not all facts dreams as soon as we put them behind us? -- Emily Dickinson
I would like more sisters, that the taking out of one, might not leave such stillness. -- Emily Dickinson
The brain is wider than the sky. -- Emily Dickinson
The Babies we were are buried, and their shadows are plodding on. -- Emily Dickinson
I lost a world the other day. Has anybody found? You'll know it by the rows of stars around it's 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! -- Emily Dickinson
The dearest ones of time, the strongest friends of the soul
BOOKS. -- Emily Dickinson
We 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 Dickinson
Dogs are better than human beings because they know but do not tell. -- Emily Dickinson
Here is a little forest Whose leaf is ever green; Here is a brighter garden, Where not a frost has been; In its unfading flowers I hear the bright bee hum; Prithee, my brother, Into my garden come! -- Emily Dickinson
open me carefully -- Emily Dickinson
For each ecstatic instant
We must an anguish pay
In keen and quivering ratio
To the ecstasy. -- Emily Dickinson
What has been the tale of me? ... (in May 16, 1848 letter to Abiah Root) -- Emily Dickinson
Soul, wilt thou toss again?
By just such a hazard
Hundreds have lost, indeed,
But tens have won all.
Angels' breathless ballot
Lingers to record thee;
Imps in eager caucus
Raffle for my soul. -- Emily Dickinson
Lest I should be old-fashioned,
I'll put a trinket on. -- Emily Dickinson
Whose fingers string the stalactite-
Who counts the Wampum of the night -- Emily Dickinson
Saying nothing sometimes says the most. -- Emily Dickinson
To lose ones faith-surpass The loss of an Estate- Because Estates can be Replenished- faith cannot-. -- Emily Dickinson
That Love is all there is
Is all we know of Love,
It is enough, the freight should be
Proportioned to the groove. -- Emily Dickinson
LOOK back on time with kindly eyes, He doubtless did his best; How softly sinks his trembling sun In human nature's west! -- Emily Dickinson
Hold dear to your parents for it is a scary and confusing world without them. -- Emily Dickinson
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee, One clover, and a bee, And revery. The revery alone will do, If bees are few. -- Emily Dickinson
Noon - is the Hinge of Day - ... -- Emily Dickinson
We were all very friendly but we were like 4 monarchs each doing their own thing. -- Emily Dickinson
How much can come And much can go, And yet abide the world! -- Emily Dickinson
It dropped so low in my regard
I heard it hit the ground,
And go to pieces on the stones
At bottom of my mind;
Yet blamed the fate that fractured, less
Than I reviled myself
For entertaining plated wares
Upon my silver shelf. -- Emily Dickinson
The spreading wide my narrow Hands / To gather Paradise-. -- Emily Dickinson
This so much joy! This so much joy! If I should fail, what poverty! And yet, as poor as I Have ventured all upon a throw; Have gained! Yes! Hesitated so this side the victory! -- Emily Dickinson
Life is the finest secret. So long as that remains, we must all whisper. -- Emily Dickinson
I do not think we have a right to withhold from the world a word or a thought any more than a deed which might help a single soul ... -- Emily Dickinson
How very sad it is to have a confiding nature, one's hopes and feelings are quite at the mercy of all who come along; and how very desirable to be a stolid individual, whose hopes and aspirations are safe in one's waistcoat pocket, and that a pocket indeed, and one not to be picked! -- Emily Dickinson
I think of love, and you, and my heart grows full and warm, and my breath stands still. -- Emily Dickinson
Susie, what shall I do - there is'nt room enough; not half enough, to hold what I was going to say. Wont you tell the man who makes sheets of paper, that I hav'nt the slightest respect for him! -- Emily Dickinson
And if, indeed, I fail, At least to know the worst is sweet. Defeat means nothing but defeat, No drearier can prevail! -- Emily Dickinson
There's a certain slant of light, On winter afternoons, That oppresses, like the weight Of cathedral tunes. -- Emily Dickinson
Who loves you most, and loves you best, and thinks of you when others rest? 'Tis Emilie. -- Emily Dickinson
One need not be a chamber to be haunted. -- Emily Dickinson
PHOSPHORESCENCE. Now there's a word to lift your hat to ... to find that phosphorescence, that light within, that's the genius behind poetry. -- Emily Dickinson
If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. -- Emily Dickinson
Split the Lark - and you'll find the Music, Bulb after Bulb, in Silver rolled. -- Emily Dickinson
Your absence insanes me so
I do not feel so peaceful, when you are gone from me. -- Emily Dickinson
Tell the truth, but tell it slant. -- Emily Dickinson
Delight becomes pictorial
When viewed through pain,
More fair, because impossible
That any gain.
The mountain at a given distance
In amber lies;
Approached, the amber flits a little,
And that 's the skies! -- Emily Dickinson
Tell all the truth but tell it slant. -- Emily Dickinson
Perhaps I asked too large
I take - no less than skies
For Earths, grow thick as
Berries, in my native town
My Basket holds - just - Firmaments
Those - dangle easy - on my arm,
But smaller bundles - Cram. -- Emily Dickinson
The days will have more hours while you are gone away. -- Emily Dickinson
Belshazzar had a letter,
He never had but one;
Belshazzar's correspondent
Concluded and begun
In that immortal copy
The conscience of us all
Can read without its glasses
On revelation's wall. -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty crowds me till I die,
Beauty, mercy have on me!
But if I expire today,
Let it be in sight of thee -- Emily Dickinson
To see the Summer Sky
Is Poetry, though never in a Book it lie
True Poems flee - -- Emily Dickinson
If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. -- Emily Dickinson
IX. 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. -- Emily Dickinson
We never know we go, - when we are going
We jest and shut the door;
Fate following behind us bolts it,
And we accost no more. -- Emily Dickinson
I do not like the man who squanders life for fame; give me the man who living makes a name. -- Emily Dickinson
Luck is not chance, it's toil; fortune's expensive smile is earned. -- Emily Dickinson
A Murmur in the Trees - to note - Not loud enough - for Wind - A Star - not far enough to seek - Nor near enough - to find -- Emily Dickinson
Which Anguish was the utterest
then
To perish, or to live? -- Emily Dickinson
Answer July-
Where is the Bee-
Where is the Blush-
Where is the Hay?
Ah, said July-
Where is the Seed-
Where is the Bud-
Where is the May-
Answer Thee-Me- -- Emily Dickinson
One step at a time is all it takes to get you there. -- Emily Dickinson
'Arcturus' is his other name- I'd rather call him 'Star.' It's very mean of Science To go and interfere! -- Emily Dickinson
To hope means to be ready at every moment for that which is not yet born, and yet not become desperate if there is no birth in our lifetime. -- Emily Dickinson
You ask of my companions. Hills, sir, and the sundown, and a dog as large as myself. -- Emily Dickinson
Celebrity is the chastisement of merit and the punishment of talent. -- Emily Dickinson
Nods from the Gilded pointers -
Nods from the Seconds slim -
Decades of Arrogance between
The Dial life -
And Him - -- Emily Dickinson
MY river runs to thee:
Blue sea, wilt welcome me?
My river waits reply.
Oh sea, look graciously!
I 'll fetch thee brooks
From spotted nooks,
Say, sea,
Take me! -- Emily Dickinson
How softly summer shuts, without the creaking of a door ... -- Emily Dickinson
Drab Habitation of Whom? Tabernacle or Tomb - or Dome of Worm - or Porch of Gnome - or some Elf's Catacomb? -- Emily Dickinson
None cannot find who seeketh, on this terrestrial ball ... -- Emily Dickinson
Elysium is as far as to
The very nearest room,
If in that room a friend await
Felicity of doom. -- Emily Dickinson
Longing, it may be, is the gift no other gift supplies. -- Emily Dickinson
It sounded as if the streets were running,
And then the streets stood still. -- Emily Dickinson
A little madness in the Spring
Is wholesome even for the King,
But God be with the Clown,
Who ponders this tremendous scene
This whole experiment in green,
As if it were his own! -- Emily Dickinson
Those who have not found the heaven below,
will fail of it above. -- Emily Dickinson
Heart, we will forget him,
You and I, tonight!
You must forget the warmth he gave,
I will forget the light. -- Emily Dickinson
Morning without you is a dwindled dawn. -- Emily Dickinson
Forever - is composed of Nows - / 'Tis not a different time - / Except for Infiniteness - / And Latitude of Home - / From this - experienced Here - / Remove the Dates - to These - / Let Months dissolve in further Months - / And Years - exhale in Years - -- Emily Dickinson
The 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
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. -- Emily Dickinson
The power to console is not within corporeal reach - though its attempt is precious. -- Emily Dickinson
There is no frigate like a book to take us lands away ... -- Emily Dickinson
The poet lights the light and fades away. But the light goes on and on. -- Emily Dickinson
I hope you love birds too. It is economical. It saves going to heaven. -- Emily Dickinson
Exultation is the going Of an inland soul to sea Past the houses, past the headlands Into deep eternity! Bred as we, among the mountains Can the sailor understand The divine intoxication Of the first league out from land? -- Emily Dickinson
Some Arrows slay but whom they strike - But this slew all but him - Who so appareled his Escape - Too trackless for a Tomb -- Emily Dickinson
Why should we censure Othello when the Criterion Lover says, "Thou shalt have no other Gods before Me"? -- Emily Dickinson
There is no Frigate like a book. -- Emily Dickinson
The Heart is the Capital of the Mind - The Mind is a single State - The Heart and the Mind together make A single Continent - One - is the Population - Numerous enough - This ecstatic Nation Seek - it is Yourself. -- Emily Dickinson
The soul unto itself
Is an imperial friend,
Or the most agonizing spy
An enemy could send.
Secure against its own,
No treason it can fear;
Itself its sovereign, of itself
The soul should stand in awe. -- Emily Dickinson
your brain is wider than the sky -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty is just a light switch away ... 'click!' Beauty is not caused. It is. -- Emily Dickinson
I stepped from Plank to Plank
A slow and cautious way -- Emily Dickinson
I love the cause that slew me -- Emily Dickinson
Open your life wide, and take me in forever. I will never be tired-I will never be noisy when you want to be still ... nobody else will see me, but you-but that is enough-I shall not want any more. -- Emily Dickinson
You 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 Dickinson
We outgrow love like other things and put it in a drawer, till it an antique fashion shows like costumes grandsires wore. -- Emily Dickinson
Hope ... never stops at all. -- Emily Dickinson
This world is not conclusion.
A species stands beyond -
Invisible, as Music -
But positive as Sound -- Emily Dickinson
I'm nobody, who are you? -- Emily Dickinson
My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun - In Corners - till a Day The Owner passed - identified - And carried Me away - -- Emily Dickinson
I never had a mother. I suppose a mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled. -- Emily Dickinson
I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality. -- Emily Dickinson
A great hope fell You heard no noise The ruin was within. -- Emily Dickinson
I know nothing in the world that has as much power as a word. Sometimes I write one, and I look at it, until it begins to shine. -- Emily Dickinson
COBWEBS. The spider as an artist Has never been employed Though his surpassing merit Is freely certified By every broom and Bridget Throughout a Christian land. Neglected son of genius, I take thee by the hand. -- Emily Dickinson
And through a Riddle, at the last--
Sagacity, must go-- -- Emily Dickinson
I ASKED no other thing,
No other was denied.
I offered Being for it;
The mighty merchant smiled.
Brazil? He twirled a button,
Without a glance my way:
But, madam, is there nothing else
That we can show to-day? -- Emily Dickinson
Pain - expands the Time - / Ages coil within / The minute Circumference / Of a single Brain - / Pain contracts - the Time - / Occupied with Shot / Gamuts of Eternities / Are as they were not - -- Emily Dickinson
We all have moments with the dust, but the dew is given. -- Emily Dickinson
He ate and drank the precious Words, his Spirit grew robust; He knew no more that he was poor, nor that his frame was Dust. -- Emily Dickinson
The hearts that never lean must fall. -- Emily Dickinson
I fear a Man of frugal speech - I fear a Silent Man - Haranguer - I can overtake - Or Babbler - entertain - But He who weigheth - While the Rest - Expend their furthest pound - Of this Man - I am wary - I fear that He is Grand - -- Emily Dickinson
There's nothing wicked in Shakespeare, and if there is I don't want to know it. -- Emily Dickinson
You don't have to be a house to be haunted. -- Emily Dickinson
The sailor cannot see the north / but knows the needle can. -- Emily Dickinson
Tis not that dieing hurts us so- tis living- hurts us more. -- Emily Dickinson
Home is the definition of God. -- Emily Dickinson
Judge tenderly of me. -- Emily Dickinson
We must be careful what we say. No bird resumes its egg. -- Emily Dickinson
We were never intimate mother and children while she was our mother - but ... when she became our child, the affection came. -- Emily Dickinson
Impossibility, like wine
Exhilarates the man
Who tastes it; Possibility
Is flavoreless. -- Emily Dickinson
Presentiment is that long shadow on the lawn
Indicative that suns go down;
The notice to the startled grass
That darkness is about to pass. -- Emily Dickinson
The possible's slow fuse is lit by the Imagination. -- Emily Dickinson
Love is its own rescue; for we, at our supremest, are but its trembling emblems. -- Emily Dickinson
Of Consciousness, her awful Mate. The Soul cannot be rid - as easy the secreting her behind the Eyes of God. -- Emily Dickinson
Adulation is
inexpensive
Except to him
who accepts
it.
It has cost
him
Himself. -- Emily Dickinson
Prayer is the little implement through which men reach; where presence is denied them. -- Emily Dickinson
You remember my ideal cat has always a huge rat in its mouth, just going out of sight - though going out of sight in itself has a peculiar pleasure. -- Emily Dickinson
A not admitting of the wound
Until it grew so wide
That all my Life had entered it -- Emily Dickinson
Dogs are better than people. -- Emily Dickinson
Truth - is as old as God - ... -- Emily Dickinson
Did you ever read one of her Poems backward, because the plunge from the front overturned you? I sometimes (often have, many times) have - A something overtakes the Mind. -- Emily Dickinson
Part Five: The Single Hound
XVIII
THERE is another Loneliness
That many die without,
Not want or friend occasions it,
Or circumstances or lot.
But nature sometimes, sometimes thought, 5
And whoso it befall
Is richer than could be divulged
By mortal numeral. -- Emily Dickinson
Nothing is the force that renovates the World. -- Emily Dickinson
Nature is our eldest mother; she will do no harm. -- Emily Dickinson
The lovely flowers embarrass me. They make me regret I am not a bee ... -- Emily Dickinson
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. -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty is not caused. It is. -- Emily Dickinson
Dreams are the subtle Dower
That make us rich an Hour
Then fling us poor
Out of the purple door. -- Emily Dickinson
The truth I do not dare to know I muffle with a jest. -- Emily Dickinson
Old age comes on suddenly, and not gradually as is thought. -- Emily Dickinson
Grant me, O Lord, a sunny mind-Thy windy will to bear! -- Emily Dickinson
There is no Silence in the Earth - so silent As that endured Which uttered, would discourage Nature And haunt the World. -- Emily Dickinson
The Past is such a curious Creature To look her in the Face A Transport may receipt us Or a Disgrace-. -- Emily Dickinson
Nature is a haunted house
but Art
is a house that tries to be haunted. -- Emily Dickinson
Other Courtesies have been -
Other Courtesy may be -
We commend ourselves to thee
Paragon of Chivalry. -- Emily Dickinson
The Soul selects her own Society. -- Emily Dickinson
These are the days when birds come back, a very few, a Bird or two, to take a backward look. -- Emily Dickinson
The vastest earthly Day Is shrunken small By one Defaulting Face Behind a Pall. -- Emily Dickinson
The past is not a package one can lay away. -- Emily Dickinson
An ear can break a human heart
As quickly as a spear,
We wish the ear had not a heart
So dangerously near. -- Emily Dickinson
Portraits are to daily faces As an evening west To a fine, pedantic sunshine In a satin vest. -- Emily Dickinson
IMMORTAL is an ample word When what we need is by, But when it leaves us for a time, 'Tis a necessity. -- Emily Dickinson
Enough is so vast a sweetness I suppose it never occurs. -- Emily Dickinson
Our lives are Swiss, so still- so cool -- Emily Dickinson
His Cheek is his Biographer- As long as he can blush. -- Emily Dickinson
He deposes Doom Who hath suffered him. -- Emily Dickinson
The sweets of pillage can be known To no one but the thief, Compassion for integrity Is his divinest grief. -- Emily Dickinson
I believe in possibility. -- Emily Dickinson
We journey to the day,
And tell each other how we sang
To keep the dark away. -- Emily Dickinson
It is finished, is never said of us -- Emily Dickinson
A dim capacity for wings demeans the dress I wear. -- Emily Dickinson
Pain has an element of blank -- Emily Dickinson
Truth is so rare, it is delightful to tell it. -- Emily Dickinson
I think Heaven will not be as good as earth, unless it bring with it that sweet power to remember, which is the staple of Heaven here. -- Emily Dickinson
Beauty is not caused, it is; Chase it and it ceases, Chase it not and it abides ... -- Emily Dickinson
All things do go a-courting,
In earth, or sea, or air,
God hath made nothing single
But thee in His world so fair. -- Emily Dickinson
Prosperity Whose sources are interior. As soon Adversity A diamond overtake. -- Emily Dickinson
In this short life
that only lasts ah hour
how much-how little-is
within our power. -- Emily Dickinson
A Dominie in Gray
Put gently up the evening Bars
And led the flock away -- Emily Dickinson
Narcotics cannot still the tooth. That Nibbles at the soul -- Emily Dickinson
Drunkards of summer are quite as frequent as Drunkards of wine. -- Emily Dickinson
Will you tell me my fault, frankly as to yourself, for I had rather wince, than die. Men do not call the surgeon to commend the bone, but to set it, Sir. -- Emily Dickinson
To ignore or use silence is a cruel tool. Hence this quote: Silence is all we dread; there's ransom in a voice; but silence is infinity. -- Emily Dickinson
Each that we lose takes part of us;
A crescent still abides,
Which like the moon, some turbid night,
Is summoned by the tides. -- Emily Dickinson
You think my gait 'spasmodic' - I am in danger - Sir - You think me 'uncontrolled' - I have no Tribunal. -- Emily Dickinson
If your Nerve, deny you
Go above your Nerve -- Emily Dickinson
The best vitality Cannot excel decay; -- Emily Dickinson
I must go in, the fog is rising. -- Emily Dickinson
Home is so far from home. -- Emily Dickinson
Life is so rotatory that the wilderness falls to each, sometime. -- Emily Dickinson
The Ocean's Heart too Smooth - too Blue -
To break for you. -- Emily Dickinson
I cannot live with you, It would be life, And life is over there Behind the shelf -- Emily Dickinson
And somebody has lost the face
That made existence home! -- Emily Dickinson
The only secret people keep is immortality. -- Emily Dickinson
It is essential to the sanity of mankind that each one should think the other crazy - a condition with which the cynicism of human nature so cordially complies, one could wish it were a concurrence upon a subject more noble. -- Emily Dickinson
My business is circumference. -- Emily Dickinson
The things of which we want the proof are those we know the best. -- Emily Dickinson
By Chivalries as tiny, A Blossom, or a Book, The seeds of smiles are planted- Which Blossom in the dark. -- Emily Dickinson
The spirit looks upon the Dust
That fastened it so long
With indignation,
As a Bird
Defrauded of it's Song. -- Emily Dickinson
Opinion is a fitting thing but truth outlasts the sun - if then we cannot own them both, possess the oldest one. -- Emily Dickinson
I am out with lanterns, looking for myself. -- Emily Dickinson
Nature is what we know / Yet have not art to say / So impotent our wisdom is / To her simplicity. -- Emily Dickinson
When I state myself, as the representative of the verse, it does not mean me, but a supposed person. -- Emily Dickinson
Action is redemption. -- Emily Dickinson
I took one Draught of Life - I'll tell you what I paid - Precisely an existence - The market price, they said. -- Emily Dickinson
Banish Air from Air
Divide Light if you dare -- Emily Dickinson
Perception of an object costs
Precise the Object's loss - -- Emily Dickinson
Lad of Athens, faithful be
To thyself,
And Mystery -
All the rest is Perjury -- Emily Dickinson
The Things that never can come back, are several- Childhood-some forms of Hope-the Dead- Though Joys-like Men-may sometimes make a Journey- And still abide-. -- Emily Dickinson
Write me of hope and love, and hearts that endured. -- Emily Dickinson
I hope your rambles have been sweet, and your reveries spacious -- Emily Dickinson
We meet no Stranger, but Ourself. -- Emily Dickinson
The appetite for silence is seldom an acquired taste. -- Emily Dickinson
God's unique capacity is too surprising to surprise. -- Emily Dickinson
Houses" - so the Wise Men tell me
"Mansions"! Mansions must be warm!
Mansions cannot let the tears in,
Mansions must exclude the storm!
"Many Mansions," by "his Father,"
I don't know him; snugly built!
Could the Children find the way there
Some, would even trudge tonight! -- Emily Dickinson
Earth is crammed with Heaven. -- Emily Dickinson
Love can do all but raise the Dead. -- Emily Dickinson
Fate slew him, but he did not drop;
She felled
he did not fall
Impaled him on her fiercest stakes
He neutralized them all.
She stung him, sapped his firm advance,
But, when her worst was done,
And he, unmoved, regarded her,
Acknowledge him a man. -- Emily Dickinson
It's such a little thing to weep -
So short a thing to sigh -
And yet - by Trades - the size of these
We men and women die! -- Emily Dickinson
Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality. -- Emily Dickinson
A sick room is at times too sacred a place for a friend's knock, timid as that is. -- Emily Dickinson
A narrow Fellow in the Grass
Occasionally rides -- Emily Dickinson
I'm a Nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? There's a pair of us- don't tell! -- Emily Dickinson
I see thee better in the dark
I do not need a light. -- Emily Dickinson
We turn not older with years but newer every day. -- Emily Dickinson
Existence has overpowered Books. Today I slew a Mushroom. -- Emily Dickinson
The career of flowers differs from ours only in inaudibleness. I feel more reverence as I grow for these mute creatures whose suspense or transport may surpass my own. -- Emily Dickinson
Speech is one symptom of affection; and silence one; the perfect communication is heard of none. -- Emily Dickinson
Faith-is the pierless bridge supporting what We see unto the scene that we do not. -- Emily Dickinson
It is true that the unknown is the largest need of the intellect, though for it, no one thinks to thank God. -- Emily Dickinson
Why joys so scantily disburse,
Why Paradise defer,
Why floods are served to us in bowls,
I speculate no more. -- Emily Dickinson
God is indeed a jealous God. He cannot bear to see, that we had rather not with him, but with each other play. -- Emily Dickinson
To live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else. -- Emily Dickinson
Whenever a thing is done for the first time, it releases a little demon. -- Emily Dickinson
Wonder is not precisely knowing. -- Emily Dickinson
My Country is Truth. -- Emily Dickinson
The hallowing of Pain
Like hallowing of Heaven,
Obtains at a corporeal cost
The Summit is not given
to Him who strives severe
At middle of the Hill
But He who has achieved the Top
All
is the price of All -- Emily Dickinson
The whole of Immortality
Secreted by a star. -- Emily Dickinson
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 agonized and clear. -- Emily Dickinson
So few that live have life ... -- Emily Dickinson
What need of Day -
To Those whose Dark - hath so - surpassing Sun -
It deem it be - Continually -
At the Meridian? -- Emily Dickinson
Expectation is contentment - Gain satiety. -- Emily Dickinson
No ladder needs the bird but skies To situate its wings, Nor any leaders grim baton Arraigns it as it sings. -- Emily Dickinson
Till I loved I never lived. -- Emily Dickinson
Till the first friend dies, we think our ecstasy impersonal, but then discover that he was the cup from which we drank it, itself as yet unknown. -- Emily Dickinson
Drowning is not so pitiful as the attempt to rise. -- Emily Dickinson
Bring me the sunset in a cup. -- Emily Dickinson
A word is dead when it is said, some say. I say it just begins to live that day. -- Emily Dickinson
Love is Immortality. -- Emily Dickinson
For love is immortality. -- Emily Dickinson
Remorse is memory awake. -- Emily Dickinson
To attempt to speak of what has been, would be impossible. Abyss has no Biographer - -- Emily Dickinson
To be alive--is Power. -- Emily Dickinson
Experiment escorts us last-
His pungent company
will not allow an axiom
An opportunity -- Emily Dickinson
I measure every grief I meet with narrow, probing eyes - I wonder if it weighs like mine - or has an easier size. -- Emily Dickinson
Summer-we all have seen-
A few of us-believed-
A few the more aspiring
Unquestionably loves ... -- Emily Dickinson
To wait an Hour - is long
If Love be just beyond
To wait Eternity - is short
If Love reward the end - -- Emily Dickinson
Forever is made up of nows. -- Emily Dickinson
Not knowing when the dawn will come
I open every door. -- Emily Dickinson
Dwell in possibility -- Emily Dickinson
They say that God is everywhere, and yet we always think of Him as somewhat of a recluse. -- Emily Dickinson
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. -- Emily Dickinson
I have an appetite for silence. -- Emily Dickinson
The soul should always stand ajar. -- Emily Dickinson
A color stands abroad on solitary hills that silence cannot overtake, but human nature feels. -- Emily Dickinson
The minister goes stiffly in As if the house were his, -- Emily Dickinson
I like a look of agony, because I know it's true -- Emily Dickinson
There is always one thing to be grateful for - that one is one's self and not somebody else. -- Emily Dickinson
I have no letter from the dead, yet daily love them more. -- Emily Dickinson
Lest Love should value less
What loss would value more,
Had it the stricken privilege ---
It cherishes before. -- Emily Dickinson
Love is like life-merely longer. -- Emily Dickinson
That it will never come again
Is what makes life so sweet. -- Emily Dickinson
Fame is a bee.
It has a song -
It has a sting -
Ah, too, it has a wing. -- Emily Dickinson
To die before one fears to die may be a boon. -- Emily Dickinson
The Spider as an Artist Has never been employed- Though his surpassing Merit Is freely certified. -- Emily Dickinson
He danced along the dingy days, and this bequest of wings was but a book. -- Emily Dickinson
I felt it shelter to speak to you. -- Emily Dickinson
They address an Eclipse every morning, whom they call their "Father." -- Emily Dickinson
My best Acquaintances are those With Whom I spoke no Word -- Emily Dickinson
This is my letter to the world That never wrote to me -- Emily Dickinson