The other day when I did the wikipedia meme, I was remembering a little theory I was working on some years ago about people born on my birth date. My theory was that there's a parsity of famous people born on that day not because, statistically speaking, there's that many fewer people born on that day than any other, but because people born on that day spend too much of their lives with their heads in the clouds to do anything as purposeful as become famous. If all of the other Decemberists are even remotely like me (which astrology would like you to believe), they have a variety of interests, but not in subjects that mankind finds much use for in day-to-day survival. Liking to know a little bit about art and philosophy and music and travel don't generally propel people to the heights of "wow, you'll be remembered forever" in the way that earning a gajillion dollars or influencing powerful people or becoming powerful in your own right will. I'm half surprised there are any names that share my birthdate that I know at all. Usually I get Kenneth Branagh and Susan Dey as the height of what my birthdate has to offer, so I was actually quite pleased to see Emily Dickinson in there along with King James I (which, arguably, wasn't something he worked for so much as walked in to when he first gained the title, and the fact that he died in such an ironic fashion has December birthday written all over it).

Now, getting back to posting some poetry after the week-end hiatus...in honor of the fact that Emily Dickinson and I share a birth date, here's one I've had at my desk for the past ::mumble mumble:: years - I was taken with it the first time I saw it and just had to print it out and put it up. Then, in that way that we do, I've packed it and unpacked it and packed it and unpacked it several times since - with those moments of packing and unpacking being the only times I ever really look at it. It's so constantly there that it's not there, you know? But then, if it weren't there I believe I'd feel the lack of it.

CXXVI

THE BRAIN is wider than the sky,
For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include
With ease, and you beside.

The brain is deeper than the sea,
For, hold them, blue to blue,
The one the other will absorb,
As sponges, buckets do.

The brain is just the weight of God,
For, lift them, pound for pound,
And they will differ, if they do,
As syllable from sound.

The numbering system for her poems has always given me the image of someone just jotting down some words off the cuff, no muss no fuss, while out enjoying a nice summer's day. But clearly she honed her thoughts and her words down to their finest, purest essence. I don't think I could express what she expressed in so few words if I were writing a 10-page essay ~ it's the miracle of poetry, for me, that anyone's able to do so. 'S wonderful.

Tags: emily dickinson