The Visit
by Jane Kenyon

The talkative guest has gone,
and we sit in the yard
saying nothing. The slender moon
comes over the peak of the barn.

The air is damp, and dense
with the scent of honeysuckle. . . .
The last clever story has been told
and answered with laughter.

With my sleeping self I met
my obligations, but now I am aware
of the silence, and your affection,
and the delicate sadness of dusk.


Jane Kenyon, “The Visit" from Collected Poems. Copyright © 2005 by The Estate of Jane Kenyon. Used by permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota, www.graywolfpress.org. (buy now)

It was on this day in 1886 that Emily Dickinson (books by this author) died at the age of 55. She wrote:

Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.

We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

She had been ill and grief-stricken for years. In 1874 her father, whom she adored, had a stroke and died. The funeral was held in the family home, but Emily stayed in her room during the service with the door ajar. A year later, her mother had a stroke which rendered her paralyzed and with memory loss. Dickinson wrote, "Home is so far from Home."

When she was in her 40s the reclusive Emily Dickinson had a romance with an aging widower, Massachusetts Supreme Court Judge Otis Phillips Lord. They wrote to each other every Sunday and their correspondence was the highlight of her week.

Dickinson's mother died in 1882, then her favorite nephew died of typhoid fever, and in 1884 Judge Lord died of a stroke. Dickinson wrote, "The Dyings have been too deep for me, and before I could raise my heart from one, another has come."

Emily Dickinson died of Bright's disease on this day in 1886. Her coffin was white and surrounded by violets.

Dickinson had made her sister promise to burn all of her letters (though some survived) but didn't give any instructions about her notebooks. There were 40 notebooks, along with various loose sheets of paper, and these contained about 1800 poems.

The first edition of Dickinson's poems was published in 1890 and edited by Mabel Loomis Todd, a woman who had an affair with Emily's brother. This edition and many after it made sweeping edits to her poems. It wasn't until 1955 that Dickinson's poems were finally published just as she herself had written them---with punctuation, capitalization, and obscure diction intact. The volume, compiled by Thomas H. Johnson, is now the authoritative edition of Emily Dickinson's poetry.

It's the birthday of the man who wrote one of the best-known tales in America, The Wizard of Oz, L. Frank Baum (books by this author) was born in Chittenango, New York, on this day in 1856. The tale, which he wrote as a children's novel, was first published in 1900. He dedicated it: "To my good friend & comrade, My Wife," Maud Gage Baum.

L. Frank Baum was a socialist. He wrote:

"There were no poor people in the land of Oz, because there was no such thing as money, and all property of every sort belonged to the Ruler. Each person was given freely by his neighbours whatever he required for his use, which is as much as anyone may reasonably desire. Every one worked half the time and played half the time, and the people enjoyed the work as much as they did the play, because it is good to be occupied and to have something to do."

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.^®

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