Emily Dickinson

«There is a Languor of the Life | More imminent than Pain - | 'Tis Pain's Successor - When the Soul | Has suffered all it can - | A Drowsiness - diffuses - | A Dimness like a Fog | Envelops Consciousness - | As Mists - obliterate a Crag. | | The Surgeon - does not blanch - at pain | His Habit - is severe - | But tell him that it ceased to feel - | The Creature lying there - | | And he will tell you - skill is late - | A Mightier than He - | Has ministered before Him - | There's no Vitality.»

«When Diamonds are a Legend, | And Diadems - a Tale - | I Brooch and Earrings for Myself, | Do sow, and Raise for sale - | And tho' I'm scarce accounted, | My Art, a Summer Day - had Patrons - | Once - it was a Queen - | And once - a Butterfly.»

«I had not minded - Walls - | Were Universe - one Rock - | And far I heard his silver Call | The other side the Block - | I'd tunnel - till my Groove | Pushed sudden thro' to his - | Then my face take her Recompense - | The looking in his Eyes - | | But 'tis a single Hair - | A filament - a law - | A Cobweb - wove in Adamant - | A Battlement - of Straw - | | A limit like the Vail | Unto the Lady's face - | But every Mesh - a Citadel - | And Dragons - in the Crease.»

«A House upon the Hight - | That Wagon never reached - | No Dead, were ever carried down - | No Peddler's Cart - approached - | Whose Chimney never smoked - | Whose Windows - Night and Morn - | Caught Sunrise first - and Sunset - last - | Then - held an Empty Pane - | | Whose fate - Conjecture knew - | No other neighbor - did - | And what it was - we never lisped - | Because He - never told.»

«Su questo mare meraviglioso | Navigando in silenzio, | Ohé! Pilota, ohé! | Conosci tu la riva | Dove non urlano i marosi - | Dove la tempesta è oltre? | Nel tranquillo ponente | Molte le vele a riposo - | Le ancore salde - | Laggiù ti conduco - | Terra Ohé! Eternità! | A riva finalmente.»

«C'è una parola | Che regge una spada | Può trafiggere un uomo armato - | Scaglia le sue acuminate sillabe | Ed è muta di nuovo - | Ma dove è caduta | Gli scampati diranno | Nel patriottico giorno, | Che qualche decorato Fratello | Esalò l'ultimo respiro. | Ovunque corra l'affannato sole - | Ovunque vaghi il giorno, | Là è il suo silenzioso assalto - | La è la sua vittoria! | Osserva il tiratore più acuto! | Il colpo più centrato! | Il più sublime bersaglio del Tempo | È un'anima "dimenticata"!»

«La mia Ruota è nell'oscurità! | Non riesco a vederne i raggi | Eppure so che i suoi stillanti passi | Girano sempre in tondo. | Il mio piede è sull'Onda! | Una strada non frequentata - | Eppure tutte le strade hanno | Una radura alla fine - | | Alcuni hanno restituito il Telaio - | Alcuni nell'operosa tomba | Trovano un bizzarro impiego - | | Alcuni con nuova - solenne andatura - | Attraversano regalmente il portone - | Rilanciando il problema | A voi e a me!»

«God permits industrious Angels - | Afternoons - to play - | I met one - forgot my Schoolmates - | All - for Him - straightway - | God calls home - the Angels - promptly - | At the Setting Sun - | I missed mine - how dreary - Marbles - | After playing Crown!»

«A happy lip - breaks sudden - | It does'nt state you how | It contemplated - smiling - | Just consummated - now - | But this one, wears it's merriment | So patient - like a pain - | Fresh gilded - to elude the eyes | Unqualified, to scan.»

«The Day that I was crowned | Was like the other Days - | Until the Coronation came - | And then - 'twas Otherwise - | As Carbon in the Coal | And Carbon in the Gem | Are One - and yet the former | Were dull for Diadem - | | I rose, and all was plain - | But when the Day declined | Myself and It, in Majesty | Were equally - adorned - | | The Grace that I - was chose - | To Me - surpassed the Crown | That was the Witness for the Grace - | 'Twas even that 'twas Mine.»

«If any sink, assure that this, now standing - | Failed like Themselves - and conscious that it rose - | Grew by the Fact, and not the Understanding | How Weakness passed - or Force - arose - | Tell that the Worst, is easy in a Moment - | Dread, but the Whizzing, before the Ball - | When the Ball enters, enters Silence - | Dying - annuls the power to kill.»

«'Tis Opposites - entice - | Deformed Men - ponder Grace - | Bright fires - the Blanketless - | The Lost - Day's face - | The Blind - esteem it be | Enough Estate - to see - | The Captive - strangles new - | For deeming - Beggars - play - | | To lack - enamor Thee - | Thò the Divinity - | Be only | Me.»

«I gained it so - | By Climbing slow - | By Catching at the Twigs that grow | Between the Bliss - and me - | It hung so high | As well the Sky | Attempt by Strategy - | I said I gained it - | This - was all - | Look, how I clutch it | Lest it fall - | And I a Pauper go - | Unfitted by an instant's Grace | For the Contented - Beggar's face | I wore - an hour ago.»

«How sick - to wait - in any place - but thine - | I knew last night - when someone tried to twine - | Thinking - perhaps - that I looked tired - or alone - | Or breaking - almost - with unspoken pain - | And I turned - ducal - | That right - was thine - | One port - suffices - for a Brig - like mine - | | Our's be the tossing - wild though the sea - | Rather than a Mooring - unshared by thee. | Our's be the Cargo - unladen - here - | Rather than the "spicy isles" | And thou - not there.»

«She lay as if at play | Her life had leaped away - | Intending to return - | But not so soon - | Her merry Arms, half dropt - | As if for lull of sport - | An instant had forgot - | The Trick to start - | | Her dancing Eyes - ajar - | As if their Owner were | Still sparkling through | For fun - at you - | | Her Morning at the door - | Devising, I am sure - | To force her sleep - | So light - so deep.»

«Heaven is so far of the Mind | That were the Mind dissolved - | The Site - of it - by Architect | Could not again be proved - | 'Tis vast - as our Capacity - | As fair - as our idea - | To Him of adequate desire | No further 'tis, than Here.»

«A Secret told - | Ceases to be a Secret - then - | A Secret - kept - | That - can appal but One - | Better of it - continual be afraid - | Than it - | And Whom you told it to - beside.»

«Of Course - I prayed - | And did God Care? | He cared as much as on the Air | A Bird - had stamped her foot - | And cried "Give Me" - | My Reason - Life - | I had not had - but for Yourself - | 'Twere better Charity | To leave me in the Atom's Tomb - | Merry, and Nought, and gay, and numb - | Than this smart Misery.»

«For Death - or rather | For the Things 'twould buy - | This - put away | Life's Opportunity - | The Things that Death will buy | Are Room - | Escape from Circumstances - | And a Name - | | With Gifts of Life | How Death's Gifts may compare - | We know not - | For the Rates - lie Here.»

«Exhilaration - is within - | There can no Outer Wine | So royally intoxicate | As that diviner Brand | The Soul achieves - Herself - | To drink - or set away | For Visiter - Or Sacrament - | 'Tis not of Holiday | | To stimulate a Man | Who hath the Ample Rhine | Within his Closet - Best you can | Exhale in offering.»