Selected Poems (Dover Thrift Editions) by Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson
Not this
For me the essential experience of poetry is the “Yes, THAT!” moment, when you read a verse, and you know EXACTLY what it means. A moment was captured, a feeling, a thought. Now, I do not claim that this is the only way to experience poetry, or the right way, or the best way. It is only my way.
This works if the mind of the poet and the mind of the reader meet. That makes the experience of poetry very personal. And, I am sorry to say, Emily Dickinson’s mind and mine didn’t often meet. It was not a complete loss. For instance, this landed
The bustle in a house
The morning after death
Is solemnest of industries
Enacted upon Earth,—
The sweeping up the heart,
And putting love away
We shall not want to use again
Until eternity.
But it was one of perhaps three poems in this collection that did. Even the famous “Because I could not stop for Death” didn’t do much for me.
Part of the problem for me was that Dickinson’s poems often show a religious sensitivity that I lack. Also, there’s a lot of nature poetry. I do not dislike nature poetry per se, but so many poets do it that the bar is very high. Edna St. Vincent Millay has the kind of unsentimental sensitivity to the natural world that feels right to me. Dickinson’s “Nature the gentlest mother” absolutely does not. My vision of nature leans toward “red in tooth and claw”.
So sad, Emily. You and I just aren’t going to work.
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