Emily Dickinson: Success

This is another one of Dickinson's poems that I really like because of how thought provoking it is and how she paints pictures in my mind with so few words.  
Though none of her original poems were titled, the editor called this one "Success."


Success is counted sweetest 
By those who ne'er succeed. 
To comprehend a nectar 
Requires sorest need.

Not one of all the purple host
Who took the flag to-day
Can tell the definition,
So clear, of victory!

As he, defeated, dying,
On whose forbidden ear
The distant strains of triumph
Burst agonized and clear!

What she is saying in this poem is so true.  It is the person that was so close to success and victory and yet ended the day defeated that knows the true definition of success rather than the victorious one.  

Emily Dickinson: Hope

This is one of my favorite poems by one of my favorite poets.  Emily Dickinson is very unique in her poetry because she mostly wrote from her imagination.  She was VERY shy her entire life, and lived in seclusion, and has a very interesting outlook on life because of this seclusion.  I love how she describes hope in this poem.  

Hope is the thing with feathers 

That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune--without the words,
And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.

Emily Dickinson is definitely one that I would love to write like some day, though never live like her.  I believe that God designed us to live in community.  

Charles Dickens

Finally, I have found the time to sit down and write again.  I am so sorry that it has been so long since I have updated, but I have been really busy :)
A friend told me that I should write on Charles Dickens, so here he is!
Here are a couple excerpts from some of his most famous books...

 A Tale of Two Cities:
"It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known."
"For you, and for any dear to you, I would do anything. If my career were of that better kind that there was any opportunity or capacity of sacrifice in it, I would embrace any sacrifice for you and for those dear to you. Try to hold me in your mind, at some quiet times, as ardent and sincere in this one thing. The time will come, the time will not be long in coming, when new ties will be formed about you--ties that will bind you yet more tenderly and strongly to the home you so adorn--the dearest ties that will ever grace and gladden you. O Miss Manette, when the little picture of a happy father's face looks up in yours, when you see your own bright beauty springing up anew at your feet, think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you!"
"I see a beautiful city and a brilliant people rising from this abyss, and, in their struggles to be truly free, in their triumphs and defeats, through long years to come, I see the evil of this time and of the previous time of which this is the natural birth, gradually making expiation for itself and wearing out..."
"Think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you."


A Christmas Carol
"There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humor."
"For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child himself"
"No space of regret can make amends for one life's opportunity misused"


Great Expectations
"suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but - I hope - into a better shape"
"That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it, and think how different its course would have been. Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day."

David Copperfield
"My meaning simply is, that whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do well; that whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself to completely; that in great aims and in small, I have always been thoroughly in earnest."
"The most important thing in life is to stop saying 'I wish' and start saying 'I will.' Consider nothing impossible, then treat possiblities as probabilities."


Nichlas Nickleby
"Happiness is a gift and the trick is not to expect it,
but to delight in it when it comes"
"The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again."
"Dreams are the bright creatures of poem and legend, who sport on earth in the night season, and melt away in the first beam of the sun, which lights grim care and stern reality on their daily pilgrimage through the world."

Okay, I think I got a little carried away, but there are only a few of the many quotes from his books that I really like!
I thought that I would do a little research on his life, so here is a very condensed version...
Charles Dickens was born in England, February 7, 1812, the son of John and Elizabeth Dickens.  When he was only 12 years old, his father was put in prison for debts, and so Charles was forced to work at Warren's Blacking Factory in order to pay back the debt. His experience at the factory would emerge most prominently in David Copperfield and Great Expectations. After this, he went to school and then found a job as a free-lance reporter. In 1836 he published Sketches by Boz.  The he began to write The Pickwick Papers, which to every one's surprise became and enormous success. After this, he started a career as a novelist. His career took off and he toured Italy, Switzerland, and France, and wrote furiously.  He died in London in 1870 after suffering from a stroke after working on The Mystery of Edwin Drood for a whole day.  The work was never finished, but it was published that September after his death. 
If you want to read more on Dickens, go to: http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dickens/dickensbio1.html

The Bells

This is one of our favorite poems, and I know that Kayla wanted to post it, but she is really busy (more than me!) so she said that I could :)

I

Hear the sledges with the bells -
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

II

Hear the mellow wedding bells -
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight!
From the molten-golden notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future! -how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

III

Hear the loud alarum bells -
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now -now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells -
Of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!

IV

Hear the tolling of the bells -
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people -ah, the people -
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone -
They are neither man nor woman -
They are neither brute nor human -
They are Ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A paean from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the paean of the bells!
And he dances, and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the paean of the bells,
Of the bells -
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells -
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells -
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells -
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.

I love this poem by Edgar Allan Poe for his word choice and how when you read it out loud the sound of bells comes through in the tempo and rhyme scheme. I like the first two because they are happy, but the last two are cool because you can really picture it.  Poe does a great job in all of his works at painting a picture in your mind.  Though many of his stories are rather haunting, there are a few like this one that are truly inspirational to me.  I want to write like that some day!

Love of Country Poems

I was flipping through a book that we have on poetry, Read Aloud Poems for Young People, and I found a section called Love of Country.  The first one you may be familiar with entitled The Battle Hymn of the Republic by Julia Ward Howe.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps,
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:
His day is marching on.

I have read a fiery gospel writ in burnished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,
Since God is marching on."

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat:
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me:
As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.

This was written as a poem and then put to music for the Union Army to sing, and today it is the one of the best known Civil War songs and one of our country's most famous anthems. 
This next poem was written by Walt Whitman, perhaps one of the most radical transcendentalists during the Romantic era of writing, and though I do not agree with his beliefs, this poem, O Captain! My Captain! is very moving.  He wrote this in honor of Abraham Lincoln.  In this poem, he likens the country to a ship and the president to the captain.

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won;The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:

But O heart! heart! heart!

O the bleeding drops of red,

Where on the deck my Captain lies,

Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;

Here Captain! dear father!

This arm beneath your head;

It is some dream that on the deck,

You’ve fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won;

Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!

But I, with mournful tread,

Walk the deck my Captain lies,

Fallen cold and dead.

This final poem was written by John Greenleaf Whittier, also on the Civil War.  This is based off of a true story.


Up from the meadows rich with corn,
Clear in the cool September morn,

The clustered spires of Frederick stand
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland.

Round about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peach tree fruited deep,

Fair as the garden of the Lord
To the eyes of the famished rebel horde,

On that pleasant morn of the early fall
When Lee marched over the mountain-wall;

Over the mountains winding down,
Horse and foot, into Frederick town.

Forty flags with their silver stars,
Forty flags with their crimson bars,

Flapped in the morning wind: the sun
Of noon looked down, and saw not one.

Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then,
Bowed with her fourscore years and ten;

Bravest of all in Frederick town,
She took up the flag the men hauled down;

In her attic window the staff she set,
To show that one heart was loyal yet,

Up the street came the rebel tread,
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead.

Under his slouched hat left and right
He glanced; the old flag met his sight.

'Halt!' - the dust-brown ranks stood fast.
'Fire!' - out blazed the rifle-blast.

It shivered the window, pane and sash;
It rent the banner with seam and gash.

Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff
Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf.

She leaned far out on the window-sill,
And shook it forth with a royal will.

'Shoot, if you must, this old gray head,
But spare your country's flag,' she said.

A shade of sadness, a blush of shame,
Over the face of the leader came;

The nobler nature within him stirred
To life at that woman's deed and word;

'Who touches a hair of yon gray head
Dies like a dog! March on! he said.

All day long through Frederick street
Sounded the tread of marching feet:

All day long that free flag tost
Over the heads of the rebel host.

Ever its torn folds rose and fell
On the loyal winds that loved it well;

And through the hill-gaps sunset light
Shone over it with a warm good-night.

Barbara Frietchie's work is o'er,
And the Rebel rides on his raids nor more.

Honor to her! and let a tear
Fall, for her sake, on Stonewalls' bier.

Over Barbara Frietchie's grave,
Flag of Freedom and Union, wave!

Peace and order and beauty draw
Round they symbol of light and law;

And ever the stars above look down
On thy stars below in Frederick town!

A Hope to the Hopeless

Today, I decided to post a poem that I wrote for a contest called a "Bully Slam." Several schools competed in poetry, essay, fiction, song, dance, and videography all against bullying in our schools.  The winners read or performed their pieces for parents and teachers (there were probably about 200 people there).  I was really excited to find out that I placed first in High School poetry.  So, here it is :)

I am surrounded by a prison of fear.

Rejection and intimidation reign supreme.

All I want to do is disappear,

Hide in my cave, do nothing but scream.

Nothing is certain; everything is pain,

I think today is the day to wake up from the dream,

I can keep hidden no more, I cannot be contained.

And yet, all I can do is I hide in my cave and do nothing but scream.

If only someone would see me in my pain,

Someone to go against the flow;

Someone to notice and break the chain,

That holds me thus in the status quo.

It took only a word of encouragement,

An understanding glance

To realize that this was something more than utter abandonment,

Something more than living stagnant.

A burst of sunlight shines through the iron grate,

There is a life beyond my prison and cave,

A time to do more than leave it up to fate,

Finally, now is the time to be brave.

This new life, how can I explain?

My prison is demolished, my soul is set free.

There is no reason to go back to the pain,

To go back to the time when all I wanted was to flee.

All I can do now is live in utter joy,

For there is Someone who is willing to save me.

And life I am finally free to enjoy.

This way is much better, and I think you would agree.

One last word to add in closing,

Is you can be that hope to the hopeless.

You can be the sun that is rising.

The question is, will you choose to be all this on your campus?

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!

"The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that your learn, the more places you'll go."

-I Can Read With My Eyes Shut

Thank you, Dr. Seuss, for helping me love reading. You opened my imagination at such a young age to wonderful characters and fantastical lands. I can't wait to write classics like yours someday.

:)