The Absence of Wavelength

On Emily

Emily, Dear Sweet Recluse
Passionate Poet

What if Emily Dickinson could only feel her poetry and could not elucidate it correctly from her tongue? Even though she might have braved the words she used to express, what if her mind and body failed her? Why be a recluse rather than boldly share epiphanies constrained to that cage called heart? Was she trapped in her beautiful house that we might dare enter? Do you muddy her worded rugs, supposing incorrectly what she meant? We can't fully know but draw near, hoping worthy to consider her poetry begging for freedom.

As poets, we can only express what's in our hearts best we know, informed by life, informed by poets like her that compel us to near that flame, setting our quills to the ink of that fire. We hope our words indelibly burn a page with the passions we flame with every construct devised by a brain burdened to serve a lonely heart driven by guilted madness in its own uniqueness.


10.17.20
8.1.22 edited, revised