The mountains grow unnoticed,
Their purple figures rise
Without attempt, exhaustion,
Assistance or applause.
In their eternal faces
The sun with broad delight
Looks long--and last--and golden
For fellowship at night.
--Emily Dickinson
poems so good i could eat them
4 comments:
Just stopping by to say "Thank you" for this poetry blog. I used to read poetry all the time, and have even penned some of my own from time to time. But in the hurry, hurry of life, I have neglected to enjoy 'more' poetic moments. Your daily reminders are reviving me. So refreshing!
Dreamlady,
Thanks for stopping by. I'm glad the blog helped whet your appetite for poetry!
just because I couldn't resist...
"TAKING OFF EMILY DICKINSON'S CLOTHES" by: Billy Collins
First, her tippet made of tulle,
easily lifted off her shoulders and laid
on the back of a wooden chair.
And her bonnet,
the bow undone with a light forward pull.
Then the long white dress, a more
complicated matter with mother-of-pearl
buttons down the back,
so tiny and numerous that it takes forever
before my hands can part the fabric,
like a swimmer's dividing water,
and slip inside.
You will want to know
that she was standing
by an open window in an upstairs bedroom,
motionless, a little wide-eyed,
looking out at the orchard below,
the white dress puddled at her feet
on the wide-board, hardwood floor.
The complexity of women's undergarments
in nineteenth-century America
is not to be waved off,
and I proceeded like a polar explorer
through clips, clasps, and moorings,
catches, straps, and whalebone stays,
sailing toward the iceberg of her nakedness.
Later, I wrote in a notebook
it was like riding a swan into the night,
but, of course, I cannot tell you everything -
the way she closed her eyes to the orchard,
how her hair tumbled free of its pins,
how there were sudden dashes
whenever we spoke.
What I can tell you is
it was terribly quiet in Amherst
that Sabbath afternoon,
nothing but a carriage passing the house,
a fly buzzing in a windowpane.
So I could plainly hear her inhale
when I undid the very top
hook-and-eye fastener of her corset
and I could hear her sigh when finally it was unloosed,
the way some readers sigh when they realize
that Hope has feathers,
that reason is a plank,
that life is a loaded gun
that looks right at you with a yellow eye.
fthluvhope: Hmm, not sure what I think...part of me is like, "Blasphemy!" Not because I'm a big Dickinson fan, but because the poor lady is dead and can't defend herself! :o) But as for the merits of the poem itself, I'm still reading and thinking...will have to check out this Collins of yours. Thanks! Am always in the mood for finding new poets.
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