A poem I wrote after visiting Emily Dickenson's grave

[Longgrain]

one spring day with my brother and his ex girlfriend, about two years ago.

I had just finished writing my first novel, and it was the first really warm sunny day of the year. The next morning i wrote this poem after leaving all the change I had on top of her grave.




Loose Change for Emily

By the Duer known as Longgrain.


22 cents is all we left
11 cents to boost my confidence

Walking through the marble pages of
A slow moving dusk,
Not far from the streets--
Tattooed by the lust of youth
And nursed by the cracking lips of
The peasants that stayed behind.

They still walk outside the cemetery
In the orange light of spring
Selling their crystal drops and bitching
About the war.

We linger among the lines of stone
Reading the names of the monuments
Inhaling obelisks of lilac smoke
Laughing, humping, hurling along among
The dead.

Poetess
Goddess
May 15, 1886

The fenced off streets beyond
Almost touching the burial ground
And the sun just doesn't’t seem to
Want to meet
With the coins of the eyes on your tomb.


And a photo of the grave it's self...

[Droopy]

1. Very nice, Longgrain

I think Emily would approve.

I read some of Dickinson's work in college. She was very difficult for me to understand. But I'm simple minded. Did you know that she only had 4 or 5 of her poems published in her lifetime? After she died and they were going through her house they found something like 2000 poems. Many of which were written on the backs of envelops.

[Steel City Slim]

3. Emily Dickinson's Poems

I had read that same thing about Emily Dickinson's poems.

[Longgrain]

2. Thanks Droop, while in Amherst you can also visit the Dickenson

homestead. There's also a Robert Frost nature trail or something like that, since Frost used to teach in Amherst.

It's a city with some strong poetic connections.

[KaliTracy]

4. I love emily. she was my one of my favorite poets in highschool,

Your poem has kicked some of those memories back into gear. I've never visted her homestead, though.

Thanks for sharing.