Author: Emily Dickinson
Quotes of Author: Emily Dickinson
I had been hungry all the years-My noon had come, to dine-I, trembling, drew the table nearAnd touched the curious wine. 'Twas this on tables I had seenWhen turning, hungry, lone,I looked in windows, for the wealthI could not hope to own. I did not know the ample bread,'Twas so unlike the crumbThe birds and I had often sharedIn Nature's diningroom. The plenty hurt me, 'twas so new,--Myself felt ill and odd,As berry of a mountain bushTransplanted to the road. Nor was I hungry; so I foundThat hunger was a wayOf persons outside windows,The entering takes away. book-quoteIt was not death, for I stood up,And all the dead lie down;It was not night, for all the bellsPut out their tongues, for noon.It was not frost, for on my fleshI felt siroccos crawl,Nor fire, for just my marble feetCould keep a chancel cool.And yet it tasted like them all;The figures I have seenSet orderly, for burial,Reminded me of mine,As if my life were shavenAnd fitted to a frame,And could not breathe without a key;And I was like midnight, some,When everything that ticked has stopped,And space stares, all around,Or grisly frosts, first autumn morns,Repeal the beating ground.But most like chaos,--stopless, cool,Without a chance or spar,--Or even a report of landTo justify despair. book-quote
