To live is so startling, it leaves but little room for other occupations.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Living, The Present, Present, Time, Life
I like a look of Agony, because I know it’s true—men do not sham Convulsion, nor simulate, a Throe—
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Suffering
Proud of my broken heart since thou didst break it,
Proud of the pain I did not feel till thee,
Proud of my night since thou with moons dost slake it,
Not to partake thy passion, my humility.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Heart
We never know how high we are till we are called to rise. And then, if we are true to plan, our statures touch the skies.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Possibilities, Potential, Hope
Unable are the loved to die. For love is immortality.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Sympathy
If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Poets, Art, Poetry
Till I loved I never lived.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Romance
I dwell in Possibility
A fairer House than Prose
More numerous of Windows
Superior—for Doors
Of Chambers as the Cedars
Impregnable of Eye
And for an Everlasting Roof
The Gambrels of the Sky
Of Visitors—the fairest
For Occupation—This
The spreading wide my narrow Hands
To gather Paradise
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Potential
Death is a Dialogue between, the Spirit and the Dust.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Dying, Death
I measure every grief I meet with narrow, probing eyes – I wonder if it weighs like mine – or has an easier size.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Grief
I felt it shelter to speak to you.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Relationships
Beauty is not caused. It is.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Beauty, Virtues
The Gleam of an heroic act,
Such strange illumination—
The Possible’s slow fuse it lit
By the Imagination.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Imagination, Possibilities
I dwell in Possibility.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Possibilities
Dogs are better than human beings because they know but do not tell.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Dogs
Anger as soon as fed is dead, ’tis starving makes it fat.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Forgiveness, Anger
To wait an Hour-is long-
If Love be just beyond-
To wait Eternity-is short-
If Love reward the end
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Romance
I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Love
A mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Mothers
Saying nothing… sometimes says the most.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Silence, Communication
I hope you love birds, too. It is economical. It saves going to Heaven.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Birds
The abdication of belief makes the behavior small—better an ignis fatuus than no illume at all.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Belief
Prayer is the little implement through which men reach; where presence is denied them.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Prayer
Superiority to fate is difficult to gain; ’tis not conferred of any, but possible to earn.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Fortune, Luck
‘Tis so much joy! ‘Tis so much joy! If I should fail, what poverty! And yet, as poor as I Have ventured all upon a throw; Have gained! Yes! Hesitated so this side the victory!
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Joy, Excitement
The past is not a package one can lay away.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Past
Let us go in; the fog is rising.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Death, Dying
Luck is not chance—
It’s Toil—
Fortune’s expensive smile
Is earned—
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Luck, Fortune
Faith is a fine invention
When gentlemen can see,
But microscopes are prudent
In an emergency.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Reality
To fight aloud is very brave, but gallanter, I know, who charge within the bosom, the Cavalry of Woe.
—Emily Dickinson
Topics: Sorrow, Sadness
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
- Edgar Allan Poe American Poet
- John Greenleaf Whittier American Poet, Abolitionist
- Thomas Bailey Aldrich American Writer
- Josiah Gilbert Holland American Editor, Novelist
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow American Poet
- Marge Piercy American Poet
- Celia Thaxter American Poet
- Thomas Wentworth Higginson American Reformer, Editor
- Anne Bradstreet American Poet
- Gertrude Stein American Writer
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