More Poems From Emily Dickinson

In a few hours, we'll be leaving for Annapolis for my sister-in-law's funeral.  It's going to be a long afternoon but I hope I can be of some comfort and support, if to no one else, my husband, whose birthday it is today.   In lieu of a post, I thought I'd reprint a few more Emily Dickinson poems on death. Although I like these, the one that I published last week is my favorite.

I read something very interesting about Miss Dickinson a short while ago.  There is some speculation she may have been autistic.  She never left her house, or "the homestead" as she called it, after the age of 26.

I can totally relate.


Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

Or rather, he passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.

We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.

Since then 'tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.

                                                *******************************************

There's been a death in the opposite house
As lately as today.
I know it by the numb look
Such houses have alway.

The neighbours rustle in and out,
The doctor drives away.
A window opens like a pod,
Abrupt, mechanically;

Somebody flings a mattress out, -
The children hurry by;
They wonder if It died on that, -
I used to when a boy.

The minister goes stiffly in
As if the house were his,
And he owned all the mourners now,
And little boys besides;

And then the milliner, and the man
Of the appalling trade,
To take the measure of the house.
There'll be that dark parade

Of tassels and of coaches soon;
It's easy as a sign, -
The intuition of the news
In just a country town.