Emily Dickinson
Revolutionary American poet of interiority
Most quoted
"The Robin’s my Criterion for Tune – Because I grow – where Robins do – But, were I Cuckoo born – I’d swear by him – The ode familiar – rules the Noon – The Buttercup’s, my Whim for Bloom – Because, we’re Orchard sprung – But, were I Britain born, I’d Daisies spurn – None but the Nut – October fit – Because, through dropping it, The Seasons flit – I’m taught – Without the Snow’s Tableau Winter, were lie – to me – Because I had not seen it go – But, this – makes not the Robin poor – Nor, of the Nut, deprive the Jay – Because the seasons flit away –"
— from Poem 347, 1862
"If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only way I know it. Is there any other way?"
— from Letter to Thomas Wentworth Higginson
"I’m ceded – I’ve stopped being Theirs – The name They dropped upon my face With water, in the country church Is finished using, now, And They can put it with my Dolls, My childhood, and the string of spools, I’ve finished threading – too –"
— from Poem 508, 1862
All quotes by Emily Dickinson (267)
After great pain, a formal feeling comes –
I died for Beauty – but was scarce Adjusted in the Tomb
Nature is a Haunted House – but Art – a House that tries to be haunted.
The Possible's slow fuse is lit By the Imagination.
I find ecstasy in living – the mere sense of living is joy enough.
Not knowing when the dawn will come I open every door.
A word is dead when it is said, some say. I say it just begins to live that day.
We turn not older with years, but newer every day.
The mind is so near itself – it cannot see, distinctly –
They might not need me – but they might – I'll let my head be just in sight –
I had no time to Hate – Because The Grave would hinder Me –
A little Madness in the Spring Is wholesome even for the King.
I think the heft of the tune resides in the silence.
To be alive – is Power –
Inebriate of Air – am I – And Debauchee of Dew –
The only secret people keep is Immortality.
I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality.
Luck is not chance – It's Toil – Fortune's expensive smile Is earned –
I measure every Grief I meet With narrow, probing, Eyes –
Publication – is the Auction Of the Mind of Man –
Contemporaries of Emily Dickinson
Other Literatures born within 50 years of Emily Dickinson (1830–1886).