Dearest Miss D.,
I hope that you have a
well-deserved place
in the balcony where you
can look down upon
scads of us mere mortals
who hold your words
in the highest esteem,
shy as you were about
publishing in your day.
I have fat books of
your poems and letters,
which you likely would
have hated, seeing as
how you wanted them
destroyed. But Emily
—if I may be so bold—
195 years after your
birth, we revere
your name much as
we do Shakespeare’s
or Miss Austen’s or even
the Beatles, some of
whose lyrics I think
you might like. That
blackbird singing in
the dead of night is
one fine bit of poetry—
an example of hope
is a thing with feathers,
if I’ve ever heard one,
or a bird that came down
the walk. And as we dwell
in possibility, we’re still
wondering, as you did,
what is so special
about the buzz of a fly?
If you’ve figured that out,
having long since joined
the ranks of the gods
and goddesses of all things
wise and wonderful,
please send us a sign,
won’t you?
•••
(In memory of Emily Dickinson, Dec. 10, 1830–May 15, 1886)
Güd wrtr 
Our twelve acres of oak and pine savanna, located within the shrub-steppe ecological province of south-central Washington, is inhabited by healthy populations of three species of non-venomous snakes. Even though my wife and I are aware of this, we never fail to be startled when chancing upon one of these reptiles. At such moments, hit by some ancient instinct with brief heart-thumping dread, I’m reminded of the last stanza of Dickinson’s A Narrow Fellow in the Grass (1865):
But never met this Fellow
Attended or alone
Without a tighter Breathing
And Zero at the Bone.
These are among my favorites of our dear Emily’s words, still potent with wicked subtlety nearly two centuries later.
Thank you, Terry, for that wonderful anecdote (and such a good phrase: “heart-thumping dread”), and the excellent reminder of that stanza. You are so right, her words are “still potent with wicked subtlety nearly two centuries later.” (Well said, my poet friend!)
Love this!
Thank you, Amrita!