Emily Dickinson has become, along with Walt Whitman, the widely acknowledged avatars of American poetry, and this book is one among dozens about her work and life published in recent years.  I found it on the shelf in our Sausalito vacation house, and it was well worth the time spent with it.

Dickinson is for me a bit of a conundrum.  Some of her poems are beautiful and moving, while others are just plain confusing and too airy-fairy for my taste.  This volume comprises 43 poems about nature, presented and numbered in the order of of Johnson’s ‘The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson’.  From #86 about butterflies and bumblebees to #1606 about a robin, these are brief, intensely focused observations of nature in her backyard in Amherst.

Two poems spoke particularly to me at this time and place.  The first was #1235 about rain since California is in the midst of an historic drought while back in Vermont the spring melt will result in flooding of the roads and valleys:  “Like Rain it sounded till it curved/And then I knew t’was Wind—/It walked as wet as any Wave/But swept as dry as sand—/When it had pushed itself away/To some remotest Plain/A coming as of Hosts was heard/That was indeed the Rain—/It filled the Wells, it pleased the Pools/It warbled in the Road—/It pulled the spigot from the Hills/And let the Floods abroad—-/It loosened acres, lifted seas/The sites of Centres stirred/Then like Elijah rode away/Upon a wheel of Cloud.”

A second beautiful poem refers to Spring Beauties, the first tiny spring wildflower to appear in New England woods after the snow melts, #1332:  “Pink—small—and punctual—/Aromatic—low–/Covert —in April/Candid—in May—/Dear to the Moss—/Known to the knoll—/Next to the Robin/In every human Soul—/Bold little Beauty/Bedecked with thee/Nature foreswears/Aniquity—“

Gotta love her use of those dashes!

The introduction may be the best part of this book.  Cott, a novelist and critic, is perhaps best known for his music criticism and deep involvement with John Lennon and Bob Dylan.  He also has bipolar disorder which he muses may well have been the case with Dickinson as well.  He underwent ECT treatment for his depression which managed to obliterate his memory for all events from 1985-2000.  It may have been that experience that led to his deeply felt and beautiful introduction to this collection of poems, an introduction that connects Dickinson (and perhaps himself) to Zen, Bansho’s poetry and the wonder and beauty of a life of solitude and close observation of nature.

Another jewel found in a friend’s library!