Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.
By EmilyDickinson535 Life
O
Our share of morning,
Our blank in bliss to fill,
Our blank in scorning.
Some lose their way.
Here a mist, and there a mist,
Afterwards—day!
H
His spirit grew robust;
He knew no more that he was poor,
Nor that his frame was dust.
He danced along the dingy days,
And this bequest of wings
Was but a book. What liberty
A loosened spirit brings!
I
I ever had, but one;
And that defies me,—as a hand
Did try to chalk the sun
How would your own begin?
Can blaze be done in cochineal,
Or noon in mazarin?
I
Then I remember not;
And if forgetting, recollecting,
How near I had forgot!
And if to miss were merry,
And if to mourn were gay,
How very blithe the fingers
That gathered these to-day!
M
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me,
As these that twice befell:
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
J
Just felt the world go by!
Just girt me for the onset with eternity,
When breath blew back,
And on the other side
I heard recede the disappointed tide!
Odd secrets of the line to tell!
Some sailor, skirting foreign shores,
Some pale reporter from the awful doors
Before the seal!
Next time, the things to see
By ear unheard,
Unscrutinized by eye.
While the ages steal,—
Slow tramp the centuries,
And the cycles wheel.