Poetessa, nato venerdì 10 dicembre 1830 a Amherst, Massachusetts (USA - Stati Uniti d'America), morto sabato 15 maggio 1886 a Amherst, Massachusetts (USA - Stati Uniti d'America)
My nosegays are for Captives - Dim - long expectant eyes - Fingers denied the plucking, Patient till Paradise - To such, if they sh'd whisper Of morning and the moor - They bear no other errand, And I, no other prayer.
Sexton! My Master's sleeping here. Pray lead me to his bed! I came to build the Bird's nest - And sow the early seed - That when the snow creeps slowly From off his chamber door - Daisies point the way there - And the Troubadour.
The rainbow never tells me That gust and storm are by - Yet is she more convincing Than Philosophy. My flowers turn from Forums - Yet eloquent declare What Cato couldn't prove me Except the birds were here!
One dignity delays for all - One mitred afternoon - None can avoid this purple - None evade this crown! Coach, it insures, and footmen - Chamber, and state, and throng - Bells, also, in the village As we ride grand along!
What dignified attendants! What service when we pause! How loyally at parting Their hundred hats they raise!
Her pomp surpassing ermine When simple You, and I, Present our meek escutscheon And claim the rank to die.
New feet within my garden go - New fingers stir the sod - A Troubadour upon the Elm Betrays the solitude. New Children play upon the green - New Weary sleep below - And still the pensive Spring returns - And still the punctual snow!
A science - so the Savants say, "Comparative Anatomy" - By which a single bone - Is made a secret to unfold Of some rare tenant of the mold - Else perished in the stone - So to the eye prospective led, This meekest flower of the mead Upon a winter's day, Stands representative in gold Of Rose and Lily, manifold, And countless Butterfly!
Within my reach! I could have touched! I might have chanced that way! Soft sauntered thro' the village - Sauntered as soft away! So unsuspected Violets Within the meadows go - Too late for striving fingers That passed, an hour ago!
Some things that fly there be - Birds - Hours - the Bumblebee - Of these no Elegy. Some things that stay there be - Grief - Hills - Eternity - Nor this behooveth me.
There are that resting, rise. Can I expound the skies? How still the Riddle lies.
As by the dead we love to sit - Become so wondrous dear - As for the lost we grapple Tho' all the rest are here - In broken mathematics We estimate our prize Vast - in it's fading ratio To our penurious eyes!