The feet of
people walking home
In gayer
sandals go,
The Crocus, till she rises,
The Vassal of the
Snow —
The lips at Hallelujah!
Long years of
practice bore,
Till bye and bye these Bargemen
Walked singing on the
shore.
Pearls are the Diver’s farthings
Extorted from the
Sea,
Pinions the Seraph’s
wagon,
Pedestrians once, as we —
Night is the
morning’s canvas,
Larceny, legacy,
Death but our rapt
attention
To immortality.
My figures fail to tell me
How far the
village lies,
Whose Peasants are the angels,
Whose Cantons dot the skies,
My Classics veil their
faces,
My Faith that dark adores,
Which from its solemn
Abbeys
Such resurrection pours!
Emily Dickinson, LXXXIV,
The complete poems of Emily Dickinson,, Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1924.
