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)
A Book is the Gate of the Soul.
The pedigree of honey Does not concern the bee; A clover, any time, to him Is aristocracy.
I measure every Grief I meet With narrow, probing, eyes – I wonder if It weighs like Mine – Or has an easier size.
To be alive – is Power – Existence – in itself – Without a further function – Omnipotence – Enough –
The Soul's Superior instants Occur to Her – alone – As Solitary Paces – Upon a Vacant Green –
The only way to shut out the light is to close your eyes.
The only Ghost I ever saw Was dressed in Mechlin – lace – She had no Body – but a Face – And that was dead – to me –
Crisis is a Hair – away – From none – to All –
The Mind is a strange room – it has no doors –
The World – is not Conclusion – A Species stands beyond – Invisible, as Music – But positive, as Sound –
Nature – is what we see – The Hill – the Afternoon – Squirrel – Eclipse – the Bumble bee – Nay – Nature is Immortality –
The Soul has Bandaged moments – When too appalled to stir –
To learn the Transport by the Pain – As Blind Men learn the Sun –
The most triumphant Bird I ever knew or met – Is one that does not sing –
Renunciation – is a piercing Virtue – The letting go – A Presence – for an Expectation –
The thought of you is to me like a tonic.
The Lamp burns surest in the Dark –
The only Barrier to Knowledge is the wish to know.
The deepest Rivers flow in silence.
The Soul has many a secret place Which Contemplation fills.
Contemporaries of Emily Dickinson
Other Literatures born within 50 years of Emily Dickinson (1830–1886).