Emily Dickinson
183 quotes
Biography
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American poet. Largely unpublished and unknown during her lifetime, her work is now widely regarded as canonical.
"To live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else."
"Where thou art, that is home."
"Success is counted sweetest by those who never succeed."
"Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul - and sings the tunes without the words - and never stops at all."
"I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality."
"Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all."
"That it will never come again is what makes life sweet."
"If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain."
"Forever is composed of nows."
"If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry."
"Not knowing when the dawn will comeI open every door."
"Morning without you is a dwindled dawn."
"I hope you love birds too. It is economical. It saves going to heaven."
"If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?"
"I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there ’s a pair of us—don’t tell! They ’d banish us, you know. How dreary to be somebody! How public, like a frog To tell your name the livelong day To an admiring bog!"
"A Word is DeadA word is deadWhen it is said,Some say.I say it justBegins to liveThat day."
"How happy is the little stoneThat rambles in the road alone,And doesn't care about careers,And exigencies never fears;Whose coat of elemental brownA passing universe put on;And independent as the sun,Associates or glows alone,Fulfilling absolute decreeIn casual simplicity."
"I know nothing in the world that has as much power as a word. Sometimes I write one, and I look at it, until it begins to shine."
"There is no Frigate like a Book To take us Lands awayNor any Coursers like a Page Of prancing Poetry – This Traverse may the poorest takeWithout oppress of Toll – How frugal is the Chariot That bears a Human soul."
"Heart, we will forget him,You and I, tonight!You must forget the warmth he gave,I will forget the light."
"My friends are my estate."
"PHOSPHORESCENCE. Now there's a word to lift your hat to... to find that phosphorescence, that light within, that's the genius behind poetry."
"The Heart wants what it wants - or else it does not care"
"One need not be a chamber to be haunted."
"Till I loved I never lived."