http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet/message/69

Hi, Dickinsonians.

Polly Longsworth, author of a biography of Emily Dickinson's
brother's steamy Amherst affair, who was not afraid to deal with
the nitty-gritty aspects of life, including sex, delivered in her biography:
*AUSTIN AND MABEL: The Amherst Affair and Love Letters of
Austin Dickinson and Mabel Loomis Todd.*

Who among the scholars and students of Dickinson quite believe
she will disappoint us in her upcoming biography?

Not I.

I have met Polly in person in Amherst, and you will not meet
a more steely-eyed level-headed shoot-from-the-hip gunslinger
of words of truth in the entire realm of writers in the world.

Sooner or later, a truthful biography will finally come to grips with
the life of Emily Dickinson as she lived it, not as some agendaed writers
supposed it. Such a truthful biography will be based on facts, and
conclusions based on those facts. Fanciful notions will become a
thing of the past. The most factual text of the biography of our
poet Emily Dickinson is by Richard Sewall and is a thousand pages
entitled *The Life of Emily Dickinson.* Enough facts are therein to
support a truthful biography but no doubt one day will be surpassed
by another, armed with new and selected facts which make a more
readable life history. Polly Longsworth was Sewall's protege.

Truth and certainty has always ruled biography, and will always rule!

That is a fair statement all scholars can agree on.

Expect Polly Longsworth to carry on Sewall's tradition, and deliver:
once again, only this time on the centerpiece of Amherst: poet and
writer Emily Dickinson, the truth of her life as she lived it.

Emily Dickinson's *Master* inspired the bulk of her poetry output,
and he cascades across her letters. So, if nearly two thousand poems
and one thousand letters have a *Master* behind them, then who he
was is a fair question: in fact, it is so central to her biography that
her biography needs a major overhaul by scholars. Of this: there
is NO question! Do Dickinsonians really think Polly Longsworth
will *skirt* the MASTER question : ) ? How can she, and deliver?

So one wonders how Polly Longsworth will deal with the telling
truth of those winter days and nights up in Emily Dickinson's
bedroom, in particular as described one winter night: in her poem
"Winter in my Room." In case you are unfamiliar with it all, it is
known as the mysterious Poem 1670 of the Johnson canon.

Poem 1670 (Johnson) is one of my top ten favorites by Emily Dickinson.
Let's refresh our minds with her poem:

Poem 1670 (Johnson), 1742 (Franklin):

In Winter in my room
I came upon a Worm
Pink lank and warm
But as he was a worm
And worms presume
Not quite with him at home
Secured him by a string
To something neighboring
And went along.

A Trifle afterward
A thing occurred
I'd not believe it if I heard
But state with creeping blood
A snake with mottles rare
Surveyed my chamber floor
In features as the worm before
But ringed with power
The very string with which
I tied him--too
When he was mean and new
That string was there--

I shrank--"How fair you are"!
Propitiation's claw--
"Afraid he hissed
Of me"?
"No Cordiality"--
He fathomed me--
Then to a Rhythm *Slim*
Secreted in his Form
As Patterns swim
Projected him.

That time I flew
Both eyes his way
Lest he pursue
Nor ever ceased to run
Till in a distant Town
Towns on from mine
I set me down
This was a dream--

--Emily Dickinson

I guess what impresses me most, as a Dickinson scholar, is the
fact IT is her most blatantly *sexual* poem. The debate *IT* has
created in Dickinson scholarship rages on. But, lest we forget, it
was created by Emily Dickinson, the American bard--Writer!

And why would she have created it if not to leave a genuine
legacy about being a normal lady, one with her awareness of the
snake in the garden of Eden, and left to defy that image she knew
would haunt her biography of the spinster nun dressed in white who
looked forlornly from an upstairs bedroom window on a world teeming
with people, sex, and normal activity in other adult bedrooms but
supposedly not hers: to have the naysayers hold court on the matter.

Trust me on this. As we journalists say: Polly Longsworth will deliver.

Probably what bothers those Dickinsonians about Poem 1670 most
is that "string" and its implications. A woman with a man on a
string is a powerful enough image, and normally not one associated
with our famous poet. But there it is around that "pink" and "lank
worm" for all its worth. My, Oh my, how that bugs Dickinsonians--a
*domineering* blatantly sexual Emily Dickinson? A woman *possessed*
by a man's "pink" and "lank worm"? A poet willing to admit and flaunt
her *sexuality* with the opposite sex? And a poet who described her
relationship *traditionally* with her feminine powers uppermost upon
the man by having him on a 'string."

And if that is not enough, God forbid! She describes how that
"pink" and "lank worm" with string attached became "A snake with
mottles rare." Whew! Enough to take one's breath away--as a reader,
of course.

But no, Emily Dickinson does not stop there. She has the "snake"
tied to her as always with that "string." Even after the "arousal"
stage: Why?

And what man in her life was dominated by this dominatrix of
"string" power as evidenced in the biographical record?

And every writer worth his/her salt KNOWS the male equivalent
is *Master*! Do not be shocked: facts have a way of paving a
path to understanding.

Maybe Polly Longswoth will have Dickinsonians finally put together
her one thousand secret love poems and myriad letters: with
a semblance of understanding. Biography has a way of doing that.

Of course, any biographer worth his salt wants to KNOW who the
"snake"-man was, and how he fit into Emily Dickinson's life? So
do Dickinsonians, scholars and students alike.

No doubt, most readers know "who" I believe that "snake"-man
was, and why: Samuel Bowles. Check out my book for a primer
on this vital question in Dickinson scholarship.

Scholars are like journalists: both must deal in what is true and
certain. In journalism it is called reporting. Reporting is separate
from commentary, which carries an element of opinion thereupon.

So: in essence, what is a report. A report is a telling of the facts:
who, what, where, when and why of people and events, anchoring
them to a historical time frame.

Then, what is a biography. A biography is a telling of the facts:
who, what, where, when and why of people and events surrounding
the central person, anchoring them to a historical time frame.

Given that: we can dismiss almost all supposed biographies which
are not factual but fraudulent supposition. It is a fraud to portray
truth and not report the facts.

What are the facts of Emily Dickinson's *Master* and why he matters
so much?

First of all, he is a he, as her pronouns throughout ALL references to him
are *masculine* without exception, in all her writings: poems and letters.

Second, he clearly in her mind as evidenced by her writings, poems and
letters, is the secret love of her life, and the secret love of her writings,
both poems and letters.

Third, scholars worldwide need to face the truth: the certainty is there,
and the evidence is clear that the *Master* was Samuel Bowles! The
evidence is certainly true that he was recipient of her love letters, and
her love poems, and he was a he, to the exclusion of a she in this matter
of who was *the Master.*

Scholarship is scholarship only if it is true and certain! Think about that
for the rest of your life if you commit to comment in the realm in any way,
shape or form.

Thus, finally, so much of what has been alleged to have been biography
about the life of Emily Dickinson must be dismissed as fraudulent. Period.

No doubt: readers of Dickinson, eventually, will get the truth and certainty.
With time, scholars will weed through the pile and separate the true grain
from the chaff.

Are YOU a Dickinson scholar, or student, who will be separated into the
grain pile,
or thrown out with the chaff?

Trust me on this. Time is on the side of truth.

As Emily Dickinson wrote, in Poem 1455, "Opinion is a flitting thing,/
But Truth, outlasts the Sun--"

We are still on square one: love :)

Bill Arnold

Bill Arnold
billarnoldfla@...
MFA, U-Mass, Amherst
Dickinson Scholar
Independent Scholar
Independent Scholar, Modern Language Association
Professor of world literature classics
Author, EMILY DICKINSON'S SECRET LOVE: Mystery "Master" Behind Poems,
230 pages, 1998.
ISBN 1-892582-00-7
---------------------------------------------------------------------

"There is magic in the web" Shakespeare (Othello, Act 3, Scene 4)

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi, Dickinsonians.

Poem 240 by Emily Dickinson is a very special poem.

Poem 240 (Johnson), circa 1861, booklet 8:

Ah, Moon--and Star!
You are very far--
But were no one
Farther than you--
Do you think I'd stop
For a Firmament--
Or a Cubit--or so?

I could borrow a Bonnet
Of the Lark--
And a Chamois' Silver Boot--
And a stirrup of an Antelope--
And be with you--Tonight!

But, Moon, and Star,
Though you're very far--
There is one--farther than you--
He--is more than a firmament--from Me--
So I can never go!

--Emily Dickinson

From my point of view, after much analysis of her 1,775 poems,
I note it is an "enciphered" poem with SAM B written all over it,
and within it.

The CAP letters are unmistakably SAM, in the first line: isn't
it interesting, she began the poem with a CAP "A" in the word "Ah"?
Thus, the first line alone has "Ah" and "Moon" and "Star" for the
full complement of SAM in CAPS? Neat, huh? By now, analytical and mathematical
minds must be wondering: why?

Well, note also, in the left margin:

A, B, A, A, A, B, S

and in the body of the text of the poem:

A, M, S, B, B, A, S, B, A, A, A, B, M, S, M, S!

Now, I can assure you that these CAPS alone should be enough
to convince even the most skeptical Dickinson scholar or student
of Dickinson that something *unusual* is afoot here [pun, of
course, on her usage of "Silver Boot" for SB initials of
Sam Bowles!].

By the way, I pointed out in my book EDSL, that "Bootes" as a key
star in a certain constellation in the Heavens is part of Emily
Dickinson's iconography and take note of it again, here! For those
interested in Emily Dickinson and her vast and correct knowledge of
astronomy--check it out.

Did you note that the beginning of the third stanza,
reinforces all of this analysis for the Doubting Thomases?

"But, Moon and Star,"

inverso, the pure ACROSTIC "reads:"

S a M B !

Of course, she used the "EXCLAMATION" [ ! ] point three times in three stanzas.
In all three stanzas she used SAM B, with the middle stanza an embedded pun on
his name: Chamois' Silver Boot!!!

What more must she do? Now, knowing this, what is our interpretation of Poem
240 (Johnson) written circa 1861, in the year of her biography when as she told
Higginson the next year, she had "a terror since September" [SeptemBer has an SB
in it?] and in my book EDSL I pointed out that Sam Bowles almost died in 1861
and took six months off in 1862 to save his life and avoid dying from
exhaustion.

Do you still wonder, Dickinsonians, who the "Master" in the poem
was?

Do you still wonder, Dickinsonians, why she did this cryptography
and same enciphering in so many, many, many, many, many, many, many
poems?

Well, Dickinsonians, wonder no more!

Bill Arnold


Bill Arnold
billarnoldfla@yahoogroups.com
MFA, U-Mass, Amherst
Dickinson Scholar
Independent Scholar, Modern Language Association
Professor of world literature classics
Author, EMILY DICKINSON'S SECRET LOVE: Mystery "Master" Behind Poems,
230 pages, 1998.
ISBN 1-892582-00-7

---------------------------------------------------------------------

"There is magic in the web" Shakespeare (Othello, Act 3, Scene 4)


---------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi, Dickinsonians.

It is quite amazing, here in the new millennium, that the
literalists still misread and misrepresent the writings of the
American bard, Emily Dickinson. It is as if these students of
Dickinson had never taken a course in world literature or in
American literature. They equate Emily Dickinson with Robert
Frost, and relegate her to a nature poet of the Hallmark cards
hall of fame. And nothing could be further from the truth.

The truth is that Emily Dickinson used three flowers to
symbolize herself, and capitalized them: Rose, Daisy and Lily.
There were others, less subtle, including the faint Gentian.

The truth is that Emily Dickinson used the Bee as the symbol of
Secret Love, her Master, often addressing him in *direct address*
in the classic manner of the troubadour poets going back to the
ancient world of the Greeks and Homeric age poetry. To her, he
was simply symbolically, "Bee," the One who came to her for her
nectar to make his golden honey combs full and stocked.

Her poem "Nobody knows this little Rose" was published by her
Master Samuel Bowles in 1858 in his Springfield Daily Republican.
No doubt Emily Dickinson saw herself as the symbolic Rose who was
married to that famous pilgrim Miles Standish from whose line
Samuel Bowles was descended. She developed the theme in numerous
poems.

In her Master letters and poems she addressed her Master
directly as the Bee, including a poem addressed directly to
Samuel Bowles, and herself as Rose, Daisy and Lily. In early
poems, she was the gentle Gentian.

Let none say that Emily Dickinson was a garden-variety poet
like Robert Frost. She was a female troubadour poet in the great
European tradition, and her King and Sovereign and Master was the
great "Bee" himself, identified in letters and letter-poems
addressed directly to him: Samuel *Bee* Bowles!

Theirs was a love born in the mystery of the ancient Greek
myths, Soul and soul mate: Psyche and Cupid! Read on, and discover
the truth which students of Dickinson cannot see, even those with
eyes and some with degrees from universities, but they must have
been asleep in their English classes. God forbid they should be
heeded in their classifying Emily Dickinson as a common
run-of-the-mill nature poet.

We know that when Emily Dickinson wrote Poem 35 (Johnson) in 1858
and Samuel Bowles published it in his Springfield Daily Republican
that in her telling line, "Nobody knows this little Rose," there was a
modicum of TRUTH in the statement.

Dickinsonians know all about the "Rose" and the "Bee"--all about
Emily Dickinson and Samuel Bowles! That is, Dickinsonians who can
read and comprehend her biography know. Of course, Dickinson
scholars are well aware of the nineteenth century art of naming flowers
for passion as in the red rose, and other feelings or emotions. The
world "feelings" aka ""pheelinks" was a common thread in their letters.

Beginning some time in 1857, Emily Dickinson spent her daily life
embedding into her autobiographical writings, ipso facto--all her
letters, poems and letter-poems--her autobiography.

Clearly, the outpouring of autobiographical details about her
Secret Love affair in circa one thousand love poems is self-evident
to all Dickinsonians with the collected works at hand and the eyes to
read with comprehension. Her circa one thousand letters offer an
eyeful, or two. Often, poems, letter-poems and letters written at the
SAMe (his initials are encoded throughout her poetry, oftentimes as
direct as capital letters) time offer the best clues to the only exegeses
which make complete sense: an autobiographical interpretation of her
canon of writings. And none in the world of Dickinson has suggested
that one thousand love letters were written in a vacuum of fantasy love
Not when there is ample evidence in the biography that they were
addressed to her Master!

The myriad Sir, Sire, Master, He, Him, His referents clearly identify
all her writings as one and the same: an autobiographical immortal
Soulmate love story written for posterity, masquerading as nature
poetry, too often trivialized as descriptive poems of landscapes
around Amherst and the Pelham Hills.

OK: the two-dozen most famously critiqued and well-crafted little
masterpieces, anthologized and beloved worldwide, are poems which
are first-rate and can stand on their own, as individual pieces,
and yet they are for the most part part-and-parcel of the grand
scheme of her passion drama like the famous Le Roman De La Rose.
Her dream allegory spread out in circa one thousand Secret Love
poems is not unlike the narrative poetic French masterpiece of the
thirteenth century. Dickinson scholars understand all of this,
but students of Dickinson deficient in a knowledge of comparative
literature need to take a walk on the wild side of love which
inspired Emily Dickinson to her own modern masterpiece, her Opus
work of of writings, as her legacy appears in her many writings.
They need to read Le Roman De La Rose, just as Emily Dickinson
steeped herself in the French classics.

As a case in point:

In Master Letter 233 (Johnson) Emily Dickinson wrote
"Master."

That is the way she started that communication to her Master,
and she wrote, to wit, the following: "If you saw a bullet hit a Bird--and he
told you he was'nt shot--you might weep at his courtesy, but
you would certainly doubt his word."

Well, there is no doubt that circa one thousand Secret Love poems,
and myriad letters and letter-poems were written to this SAMe
Master who she soon wrote "God made me--Sir--Master" and left
no doubt that her *male* recipient was her one and only Master,
the one who held the loaded gun and shot her through her vulnerable
heart with the modern love bullet rather than the mythic Cupid
arrow! She literally died in his arms, and yet lived to tell all
posterity the TRUTH of their Secret Love affair. And her metaphors
were uniquely her own, in this, her tale of immortal
SOULMATE LOVE!

Someone, somewhere, of no great consequence, once said
that "the 'master' question is there, but of no great consequence."
Of course, the lie within that questionable statement is patently
false, inasmuch as these same "of no great consequence" writers
would have you believe they can offer up any valid exegesis of the
circa one thousand Secret Love poems and myriad letters written by
Emily Dickinson to and about that same *masculine* Master of great
and significant consequence not only in TRUTHFUL interpretations
of her poems, but elucidation of her letters via her biographical
events during her lifetime.

One wonders did Emily Dickinson write about her Secret Master in
symbols? Did she write it so scholars and students of Dickinson
would comment on her style of creating autobiographical writing?
Or did she write her poems, letters, and letter-poems so readers
would become engaged with the persona of herself and her Secret
Love, her Master, and their immortal Soulmate story?

Surely, Dickinsonians, of all readers in the world, know by
now that Emily Dickinson had her secret love belief about her own
writings, and expected all and sundry to read her writings with a
troubadour poet's outpouring in mind.

Her sister Lavinia was quoted as
having written of Emily Dickinson:

"Emily was herself a most charming reader. It was done with
great simplicity and naturalness, with an earnest desire to
express the exact conception of the author, without any thought
of herself, or the impression her reading was sure to make."

Now, the key buzz words appear to me to be "exact" and
"conception" and "author."

Sorry
about that, folks, but the TRUTH hurts!

The TRUTH is that Emily Dickinson believed in the
"exact conception of the author."

Well, welcome to Emily Dickinson's world of perspecuity: Poem 1455,
"Opinion is a flitting thing, / But Truth, outlasts the Sun--"

Emily Dickinson and Samuel Bowles are UP THERE, looking down and
smiling at us Dickinsonians. Soulmates among the Blessed!

So: WHO was that masked man, the Master, anyway?

The TRUTH of her biography IS: the masculine Master
was Samuel Bowles of Springfield.

Read: B-I-O-G-R-A-P-H-Y !

The TRUTH of the matter at hand, her biography, IS: the
female "Queen" of her King Master Samuel Bowles was,
as far as Emily Dickinson saw fit, herself!

When Emily Dickinson wrote Letter 268 (Johnson) in those 1862 days
after Master Sam Bowles went to Europe and left her in
the lurch, she was seeking her third "Master"! Not the LOVE of her
life, as she had already had that in SAM B. She gave us the woven
tapestry, and it was ours to see as she, Emily Dickinson, spun her web of
intrigue in her exact conception: a story of immortal secret love.


In literary criticism, some writers and scholars who were of
the school of the New Critics were *purists*and called reading
into poems anything of the poet's life, "the biographical fallacy."
Then those same critics expanded their thinking into newer ventures
called Structuralism, and eventually, the school of Deconstruction.

But, Dickinsonians, Emily Dickinson herself would have none of
these schools of thought inasmuch as she was of the old, old school:
that poems have meaning, as the words of the poems have meaning, and
she sought "the exact conception of the author." Otherwise, why
would she refer SO OFTEN to the "Master" and "Sir" and
"Sire"--the masculine referent so OBVIOUS in her circa one
thousand Secret Love poems? Of course she had girlfriends, and the
love of her sister, but men were equally the love of her life, and her
Master was none other than Samuel Bowles, her editor, and her
publisher, of the most poems she allowed printed in the press in
her lifetime!

Truth of the biography and how it applies to exegeses of
her autobiographical poems is the only thing which is going to solve
the mystery of what was Emily Dickinson's "exact conception of the
author."

When asked about my beliefs that the biography of Emily
Dickinson should be formed as the basis for poem interpretation,
the noted UMass-Amherst professor and Dickinson scholar David Porter
was quoted in an interview in the *Springfield Union News* as
saying: "readers need to read what Arnold has to say and judge
for themselves." He was referring to my book about Emily Dickinson
and Samuel Bowles, cited in my sig file! It is good advice by a
Dickinson scholar of noted repute in academe.

Master Letter 233 (Johnson) was written by Emily Dickinson and
unlike poems manufactured into booklets, it is a letter-poem meant
for Samuel Bowles, signed, internally "Daisy," in ink, circa winter
1861, while Samuel Bowles, her Master, was in New York state and his
wife was delivering their child, Charles, which Emily Dickinson wanted
named Robert. Emily Dickinson, however, left it in her personal
effects after her death, thus placing it into the series of her love
letters to the world, and made it explicit by its content that the
"Master" was *not* Jesus, and yet the letter-poem clearly is about her
Secret "Sir/Master;" you see, the love letter to her Master Samuel
Bowles, is in the Amherst College Special Collections, and of which now
I will share some very special aspects of this Master and his *Queen*
primary document of TRUTH:

Dickinsonians, we begin this thread with a careful and judicious reading
of Master Letter 233 clearly identifies the recipient as Samuel Bowles. No
doubt, all the evidence of the biography as known of Emily Dickinson puts
the "Sir/Master" as a REAL person, named: Samuel Bowles. No one needed
to doctor a document to suggest the Master had a "beard" as the letter
Emily Dickinson wrote makes that tacitly CLEAR. What else the meaning:
paraphrased, if you had my petals, as in, I, Emily Dickinson, the
flower, Daisy, and I were you, the bearded Master, who should make the
moves, and fly up here and come to Amherst from New York, and pollenate
my blossom, and what would happen to you if the roles were reversed?
It is clear from the letter, that the Master was showing reluctance to
make the trip and visit his Secret Love.

Not only that, we have the internal evidence of the word "Sir"
at least four times, and that IS enough to warrant this Letter 233
as a document in INK in which none can doubt that her "Sir/Master"
was the same "Sir/Master" of circa one thousand Secret Love poems.
When one tells the truth as a scholar, the same rules of a court of law
apply. Truth by commission/omission is a fundamental tenet of the law.
Violate either side of the equation, and the truth test has not been met.

So, what WAS her "exact conception of the author" in "Sir/Master"
Letter 233?

So, WHO was this "Sir/Master" who was a "cipher/cypher" in
"Sir/Master" Letter 233?

Well, the "EXACT" same "*your Queen*" referents in "Sir/Master"
Letter 233 and in "Sir/Master" Letter 249, also in ink, and signed
"Emily," and sent to Samuel Bowles, clearly identifies the recipient
as Samuel Bowles, her editor/Secret Love.

Dickinsonians know that Emily Dickinson's Master was
Samuel Bowles, inasmuch as all the corollary evidence supports
the fact: the biographical record clearly proves that all the
"Bee" and "Rose" and Daisy" and "Lily" referents embedded
in letters to her Master, and letter-poems to Samuel Bowles,
and circa one thousand secret love poems to her Master, with
SAM B letters in capitalized form was created by her to leave
a legacy and poetic record of this greatest of love affairs
of the nineteenth century in American literature, by the
American bard, Emily Dickinson, writer!

We are still on square one: love :)

Bill Arnold

Bill Arnold
billarnoldfla@yahoogroups.com
MFA, U-Mass, Amherst
Dickinson Scholar
Independent Scholar
Independent Scholar, Modern Language Association
Professor of world literature classics
Author, EMILY DICKINSON'S SECRET LOVE: Mystery "Master" Behind Poems,
230 pages, 1998.
ISBN 1-892582-00-7
---------------------------------------------------------------------

"There is magic in the web" Shakespeare (Othello, Act 3, Scene 4)

________________________________________________________________________________

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet/message/58

Hi, Dickinsonians.

We know that when Emily Dickinson wrote Poem 35 (Johnson) in 1858
and Samuel Bowles published it in his Springfield Daily Republican
that in her telling line, "Nobody knows this little Rose," there
was a modicum of TRUTH in the statement.

Dickinsonians know all about the "Rose" and the "Bee"--all about
Emily Dickinson and Samuel Bowles! That is, Dickinsonians who can
read and comprehend her biography know.

Beginning some time in 1857, Emily Dickinson spent her daily life
embedding into her autobiographical writings, ipso facto--all her
letters, poems and letter-poems- -her "biography."

Clearly, the outpouring of autobiographical details about her
Secret Love affair in circa one thousand love poems is self-evident
to all Dickinsonians with the collected works at hand and the eyes to
read with comprehension. Her circa one thousand letters offer an
eyeful, or two. Often, poems, letter-poems and letters
written at the SAMe time offer the best clues to the only exegeses
which make complete sense: an autobiographical interpretation of her
canon of writings. And none in the world of Dickinson has suggested
that one thousand love letters were written in a vacuum of fantasy love
Not when there is ample evidence in the biography that they were
addressed to her Master!

The myriad Sir, Sire, Master, He, Him, His referents clearly identify
all her writings as one and the same: an autobiographical immortal
Soulmate love story written for posterity, masquerading as poetry.

OK: the two-dozen most famously critiqued and well-crafted little
masterpieces, anthologized and beloved worldwide, are poems which
are first-rate and can stand on their own, as individual pieces,
and yet they are for the most part part-and-parcel of the grand
scheme of her passion drama like the famous Le Roman De La Rose.
Her dream allegory spread out in circa one thousand Secret Love
poems is not unlike the narrative poetic French masterpiece of the
thirteenth century. Dickinson scholars understand all of this,
but students of Dickinson deficient in a knowledge of comparative
literature need to take a walk on the wild side of love which
inspired Emily Dickinson to her own modern masterpiece, her Opus
work of of writings, as her legacy appears in her many writings.
They need to read Le Roman De La Rose, just as Emily Dickinson
steeped herself in the French classics.

As a case in point:

In Master Letter 233 (Johnson) Emily Dickinson wrote "Master."

That is the way she started that communication to her Master,
and she wrote, to wit,
the following: "If you saw a bullet hit a Bird--and he told you
he was'nt shot--you might weep at his courtesy, but you would
certainly doubt his word."

Well, there is no doubt that circa one thousand Secret Love poems,
and myriad letters and letter-poems were written to this SAMe
Master who she soon wrote "God made me--Sir--Master" and left
no doubt that her *male* recipient was her one and only Master,
the one who held the loaded gun and shot her through her vulnerable
heart with the modern love bullet rather than the mythic Cupid
arrow! She literally died in his arms, and yet lived to tell all
posterity the TRUTH of their Secret Love affair. And her metaphors
were uniquely her own, in this, her tale of immortal SOULMATE LOVE!

Someone, somewhere, of no great consequence, once said that "the
'master' question is there, but of no great consequence. "
Of course, the lie within that questionable statement is patently
false, inasmuch as these same "of no great consequence" writers
would have you believe they can offer up any valid exegesis of the
circa one thousand Secret Love poems and myriad letters written by
Emily Dickinson to and about that same *masculine* Master of great
and significant consequence not only in TRUTHFUL interpretations
of her poems, but elucidation of her letters via her biographical
events during her lifetime.

One wonders did Emily Dickinson write about her Secret Master in
symbols? Did she write it so scholars and students of Dickinson
would comment on her style of creating autobiographical writing?
Or did she write her poems, letters, and letter-poems so readers
would become engaged with the persona of herself and her Secret
Love, her Master, and their immortal Soulmate story?

Surely, Dickinsonians, of all readers in the world, know by
now that Emily Dickinson had her secret love belief about her own
writings, and expected all and sundry to read her writings with a
troubadour poet's outpouring in mind.

Her sister Lavinia was quoted as
having written of Emily Dickinson:

"Emily was herself a most charming reader. It was done with
great simplicity and naturalness, with an earnest desire to
express the exact conception of the author, without any thought
of herself, or the impression her reading was sure to make."

Now, the key buzz words appear to me to be "exact" and "conception"
and "author."

Sorry
about that, folks, but the TRUTH hurts!

The TRUTH is that Emily Dickinson believed in the "exact conception
of the author."

Well, welcome to Emily Dickinson's world of perspecuity: Poem 1455,
"Opinion is a flitting thing, / But Truth, outlasts the Sun--"

Emily Dickinson and Samuel Bowles are UP THERE, looking down and
smiling at us Dickinsonians. Soulmates among the Blessed!

So: WHO was that masked man, the Master, anyway?

The TRUTH of her biography IS: the masculine Master was
Samuel Bowles of Springfield.

Read: B-I-O-G-R-A- P-H-Y !

The TRUTH of the matter at hand, her biography, IS: the
female "Queen" of her King Master Samuel Bowles was,
as far as Emily Dickinson saw fit, herself!

When Emily Dickinson wrote Letter 268 (Johnson) in those 1862 days
after Master Sam Bowles went to Europe and left her in the lurch, she
was seeking her third "Master"! Not the LOVE of her life, as she had
already had that in SAM B. She gave us the woven tapestry, and it was
ours to see as she, Emily Dickinson, spun her web of intrigue in her
exact conception: a story of immortal secret love.

In literary criticism, some writers and scholars who were of
the school of the New Critics were *purists*and called reading
into poems anything of the poet's life, "the biographical fallacy."
Then those same critics expanded their thinking into newer ventures
called Structuralism, and eventually, the school of Deconstruction.

But, Dickinsonians, Emily Dickinson herself would have none of
these schools of thought inasmuch as she was of the old, old school:
that poems have meaning, as the words of the poems have meaning, and
she sought "the exact conception of the author." Otherwise, why
would she refer SO OFTEN to the "Master" and "Sir" and "Sire"--the
masculine referent so OBVIOUS in her circa one thousand Secret Love
poems?

Truth of the biography and how it applies to exegeses of
her autobiographical poems is the only thing which is going to solve
the mystery of what was Emily Dickinson's "exact conception of the
author."

When asked about my beliefs that the biography of Emily
Dickinson should be formed as the basis for poem interpretation,
the noted UMass-Amherst professor and Dickinson scholar David Porter
was quoted in an interview in the *Springfield Union News* as
saying: "readers need to read what Arnold has to say and judge
for themselves." He was referring to my book about Emily Dickinson
and Samuel Bowles, cited inh my sig file!

Master Letter 233 (Johnson) was written by Emily Dickinson and
unlike poems manufactured into booklets, it is a letter-poem meant
for Samuel Bowles, signed, internally "Daisy," in ink, circa winter
1861, while Samuel Bowles, her Master, was in New York state and his
wife was delivering their child, Charles, which Emily Dickinson wanted
named Robert. Emily Dickinson, however, left it in her personal
effects after her death, thus placing it into the series of her love
letters to the world, and made it explicit by its content that the
"Master" was *not* Jesus, and yet the letter-poem clearly is about her
Secret "Sir/Master; " you see, the love letter to her Master Samuel
Bowles, is in the Amherst College Special Collections, and of which now
I will share some very special aspects of this Master and his *Queen*
primary document of TRUTH:

Dickinsonians, we begin this thread with a careful and judicious reading
of Master Letter 233 clearly identifies the recipient as Samuel Bowles. No
doubt, all
the evidence of the biography as known of Emily Dickinson puts the
"Sir/Master" as a REAL person, named: Samuel Bowles. No one needed
to doctor a document to suggest the Master had a "beard" as the letter
Emily Dickinson wrote makes that tacitly CLEAR. What else the meaning:
paraphrased, if you had my petals, as in, I, Emily Dickinson, the
flower, Daisy, and I were you, the bearded Master, who should make the
moves, and fly up here and come to Amherst from New York, and pollenate
my blossom, and what would happen to you if the roles were reversed?
It is clear from the letter, that the Master was showing reluctance to
make the trip and visit his Secret Love.

Not only that, we have the internal evidence of the word "Sir"
at least four times, and that IS enough to warrant this Letter 233
as a document in INK in which none can doubt that her "Sir/Master"
was the same "Sir/Master" of circa one thousand Secret Love poems.
When one tells the truth as a scholar, the same rules of a court of law
apply. Truth by commission/omission is a fundamental tenet of the law.
Violate either side of the equation, and the truth test has not been met.

So, what WAS her "exact conception of the author" in "Sir/Master"
Letter 233?

So, WHO was this "Sir/Master" who was a "cipher/cypher" in
"Sir/Master" Letter 233?

Well, the "EXACT" same "*your Queen*" referents in "Sir/Master"
Letter 233 and in "Sir/Master" Letter 249, also in ink, and signed
"Emily," and sent to Samuel Bowles, clearly identifies the recipient
as Samuel Bowles, her editor/Secret Love.

Dickinsonians know that Emily Dickinson's Master was
Samuel Bowles, inasmuch as all the corollary evidence supports
the fact: the biographical record clearly proves that all the
"Bee" and "Rose" and Daisy" and "Lily" referents embedded
in letters to her Master, and letter-poems to Samuel Bowles,
and circa one thousand secret love poems to her Master, with
SAM B letters in capitalized form was created by her to leave
a legacy and poetic record of this greatest of love affairs
of the nineteenth century in American literature, by the
American bard, Emily Dickinson, writer!

We are still on square one: love :)

Bill Arnold

Bill Arnold
billarnoldfla@ yahoo.com
MFA, U-Mass, Amherst
Dickinson Scholar
Independent Scholar
Independent Scholar, Modern Language Association
Professor of world literature classics
Author, EMILY DICKINSON'S SECRET LOVE: Mystery "Master" Behind Poems,
230 pages, 1998.
ISBN 1-892582-00- 7
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -

"There is magic in the web" Shakespeare (Othello, Act 3, Scene 4)

------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -

Emily Dickinson Poet

Come: join now!

Emily Dickinson: poet, poetry, biography, scholarship, study, place in
humanities history, commentary about her life and writings. Questions
answered by scholars. All welcome. Archives open to the public. Focus
on the reason Emily Dickinson remained unpublished in her lifetime.
The mystery *Master* (known to her as *Mister Sam,* an inverso-anagram)
behind her poems is revealed by the breakthrough scholarship book
*Emily Dickinson's Secret Love* by Dickinson scholar Bill Arnold, group
contributor . Her 1,775 poems, often misconstrued as *cryptic,* are
mostly *Secret Love* poems with a cabalistic code intended to be
de-coded after her and her Secret Love's death. Her unusual *Capital*
letters, spelling his name in acrostics and anagrams, now makes sense.
Her biography verifies this scholarly interpretation of her writings: her
1,050 letters and myriad love poems. The untold story of Emily Dickinson's
*Secret Love*
can now be told in its entirety. She disclosed their affair and
his name via cryptography in the tradtion of the French courtly-love poets
she studied in her Holyoke-Amherst education days and readings in the
classics of literature. Her *Secret Love* Sam Bowles, publisher of the
*Springfield Daily Republican,* published a half-dozen of her
carefully-crafted crossword puzzle poems in his newspaper. They had
met at her home in Amherst when she was 18 and he was 23. He
published her first poem when she was 20. Sam Bowles and her
Congressman-father from Massachusetts founded the Republican party.
As a respected journalist with a wife and family, it was untenable for
them to suffer the gossip of a scandalous love affair in the middle of the
Nineteenth
century. The flaming-redhead poetess found a way to make
the stuff of legends by embedding their affair in thousands of her now
famous poems. Read the true story in *Emily Dickinson's Secret Love*
and posts discussed at length at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet

Emily Dickinson Poet

Emily Dickinson: poet, poetry, biography, scholarship, study, place in
humanities history, commentary about her life and writings. Questions
answered by scholars. All welcome. Archives open to the public. Focus
on the reason Emily Dickinson remained unpublished in her lifetime.
The mystery *Master* (known to her as *Mister Sam,* an inverso-anagram)
behind her poems is revealed by the breakthrough scholarship book
*Emily Dickinson's Secret Love* by Dickinson scholar Bill Arnold, group
contributor . Her 1,775 poems, often misconstrued as *cryptic,* are
mostly *Secret Love* poems with a cabalistic code intended to be
de-coded after her and her Secret Love's death. Her unusual *Capital*
letters, spelling his name in acrostics and anagrams, now makes sense.
Her biography verifies this scholarly interpretation of her writings: her
1,050 letters and myriad love poems. The untold story of Emily Dickinson's
*Secret Love*
can now be told in its entirety. She disclosed their affair and
his name via cryptography in the tradtion of the French courtly-love poets
she studied in her Holyoke-Amherst education days and readings in the
classics of literature. Her *Secret Love* Sam Bowles, publisher of the
*Springfield Daily Republican,* published a half-dozen of her
carefully-crafted crossword puzzle poems in his newspaper. They had
met at her home in Amherst when she was 18 and he was 23. He
published her first poem when she was 20. Sam Bowles and her
Congressman-father from Massachusetts founded the Republican party.
As a respected journalist with a wife and family, it was untenable for
them to suffer the gossip of a scandalous love affair in the middle of the
Nineteenth
century. The flaming-redhead poetess found a way to make
the stuff of legends by embedding their affair in thousands of her now
famous poems. Read the true story in *Emily Dickinson's Secret Love*
and posts discussed at length at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet

Emily Dickinson Poet

Emily Dickinson: poet, poetry, biography, scholarship, study, place in
humanities history, commentary about her life and writings. Questions
answered by scholars. All welcome. Archives open to the public. Focus
on the reason Emily Dickinson remained unpublished in her lifetime.
The mystery *Master* (known to her as *Mister Sam,* an inverso-anagram) behind
her
poems is revealed by the breakthrough scholarship book
*Emily Dickinson's Secret Love* by Dickinson scholar Bill Arnold, group
contributor . Her
1,775 poems, often misconstrued as *cryptic,* are
mostly *Secret Love* poems with a cabalistic code intended to be
de-coded after her and her Secret Love's death. Her unusual *Capital*
letters, spelling his name in acrostics and anagrams, now makes sense.
Her biography verifies this scholarly interpretation of her writings: her
1,050 letters and myriad love poems. The untold story of Emily Dickinson's
*Secret Love*
can now be told in its entirety. She disclosed their affair and
his name via cryptography in the tradtion of the French courtly-love poets
she studied in her Holyoke-Amherst education days and readings in the
classics of literature. Her *Secret Love* Sam Bowles, publisher of the
*Springfield Daily Republican,* published a half-dozen of her
carefully-crafted crossword puzzle poems in his newspaper. They had
met at her home in Amherst when she was 18 and he was 23. He
published her first poem when she was 20. Sam Bowles and her
Congressman-father from Massachusetts founded the Republican party.
As a respected journalist with a wife and family, it was untenable for
them to suffer the gossip of a scandalous love affair in the middle of the
Nineteenth
century. The flaming-redhead poetess found a way to make
the stuff of legends by embedding their affair in thousands of her now
famous poems. Read the true story in *Emily Dickinson's Secret Love*
and posts discussed at length at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet

Emily Dickinson Poet

Emily Dickinson: poet, poetry, biography, scholarship, study, place in
humanities history, commentary about her life and writings. Questions
answered by scholars. All welcome. Archives open to the public. Focus
on the reason Emily Dickinson remained unpublished in her lifetime.
The mystery *Master* (known to her as *Mister Sam,* an inverso-anagram) behind
her
poems is revealed by the breakthrough scholarship book
*Emily Dickinson's Secret Love* by Dickinson scholar Bill Arnold, group
contributor . Her
1,775 poems, often misconstrued as *cryptic,* are
mostly *Secret Love* poems with a cabalistic code intended to be
de-coded after her and her Secret Love's death. Her unusual *Capital*
letters, spelling his name in acrostics and anagrams, now makes sense.
Her biography verifies this scholarly interpretation of her writings: her
1,050 letters and myriad love poems. The untold story of Emily Dickinson's
*Secret Love*
can now be told in its entirety. She disclosed their affair and
his name via cryptography in the tradtion of the French courtly-love poets
she studied in her Holyoke-Amherst education days and readings in the
classics of literature. Her *Secret Love* Sam Bowles, publisher of the
*Springfield Daily Republican,* published a half-dozen of her
carefully-crafted crossword puzzle poems in his newspaper. They had
met at her home in Amherst when she was 18 and he was 23. He
published her first poem when she was 20. Sam Bowles and her
Congressman-father from Massachusetts founded the Republican party.
As a respected journalist with a wife and family, it was untenable for
them to suffer the gossip of a scandalous love affair in the middle of the
Nineteenth
century. The flaming-redhead poetess found a way to make
the stuff of legends by embedding their affair in thousands of her now
famous poems. Read the true story in *Emily Dickinson's Secret Love*
and posts discussed at length at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet

Emily Dickinson Poet invitation to join

  To visit a new Emily Dickinson group on the web, go to:

  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EmilyDickinsonPoet/

or Go to Yahoo! and paste in above:

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Archives open to the public

apsara dancers
so quiet and forlorn
in the corridors

john tiong chunghoo

MORE CAMBODIAN TRAVEL POETRY AT

http://www.poemhunt er.com/poem/ cambodia- travel-poem- series-a-
time-
machine/

http://www.poemhunt er.com/poem/ cambodia- travel-the- killing-fields-
  a-
haibun/

http://www.poemhunt er.com/poem/ cambodia- travel-haiku- series-
angkor-
wat/

the old well is an old woman
dispirited, bent over and aggrieved
of all its drawers over the years

a dark realm now reigns over here
ever ready to use its chagrin on
unsuspectful strangers

only heaven has the generosity
to give it grace all these years
the rain fills it up and the sky
always plays with it a childful game
of master sun, queen moon and angel stars

nobody greets it a good morning
or evening, all they do is rudely
bend over its mouth, throw in the bucket,
and draw its vitality from
the deepest part of itssoul
yesterday, today, tomorrow
water splashing all over the rim
all is the hurry, and wastage

the old well is an aggrieved woman
beaten to hatred and is but now
a poor haunting weeping ghost
in a realm all of its own -
of discontentment and vengeance

to pass by one at night
one would be lucky if one's heart
does not race faster than one's legs
for its ominous mouth
in all solemness of a full moon
is ever ready to draw in your spirit
with its dark, damp and cold tales
and selfishly holds it there
with the tenuous grip of a cobra
for a thousand years

by john tiong chunghoo

if you like my poem
please visit me at poemhunter.com

your eyes carry
all your desires

your eyes, so bleary,
so scintilatingly youthful
chain me to
your irresistible
patch of field

a cyclone gobbling up
everything on its way

or is it the other way round? and your eyes
the window to these?

ying and yang
looking for ways
out of chains to
frolic in estacsy

by john tiong chunghoo

Hail, poetasters,

I'm a brand new member who's self-published a memoir containing
things like what is to follow--the kind of poetry analysis I could
not get away with as a high school English teacher/textbook author
but can indulge myself in as a retiree.  If you are interested in
more of what's coming, check out www.kerrymwood.com.

                                                 TYING ONE ON WITH EMILY

I can never be a wine connoisseur.  My sense of smell is not keen,
and a discriminating olfactory sense is a sine qua non for precise
discernment and evaluation.  Yes, I know when a wine is downright
awful, but given a  blind taste test comparing elegant vintage wines
and their Two-Buck Chuck counterparts, I'll choose the cheap stuff
probably half the time.

The same goes for my appreciation of pictorial art.  I skipped the
college course in art appreciation.  I recognize the beauty of the
classics and have my own unschooled preferences, but that's about
it.  When my wife thinks about foreign travel, she focuses on museums
and art galleries.  I think about wandering through exotic cities or
quaint neighborhoods, trying new cuisines and quaffing brews with the
locals. Sally can sit and revel in a single painting for the same
amount of time it takes me to stroll the entire Louvre.

              I am led to this musing by contemplation of Emily
Dickinson's "I taste a liquor never brewed," wherein the poet
celebrates her enchantment with nature in a playful extended metaphor.

                                      I TASTE A LIQUOR NEVER BREWED

Emily Dickinson

				    I taste a liquor never brewed,

                                      From Tankards scooped in Pearl;

                                      Not all the Vats upon the Rhine

                                      Yield such an Alcohol!



                                      Inebriate of air am I,

                                      And debauchee of dew,

				     Reeling thro endless summer days,

                                      From inns of molten blue.



                                      When landlords turn the drunken bee

                                      Out of the foxglove's door,

                                      When butterflies renounce their
drams,

                                      I shall but drink the more!



                                      Till seraphs swing their snowy
hats,

                                      And saints to windows run,

                                      To see the little tippler

                                      Leaning against the Sun!

              The poem makes me aware that words and language delight
and intoxicate me the way a Chateau Lafitte Rothschild pleases an
oenophile, the Uffizi gallery excites an art buff,  and Emily gets
drunk on warmth, sunshine and clouds.

              Savoring Emily's four quatrains—rolling them about on my
tongue and ear—gives me the heady satisfaction that the little lady
from Amherst gets from air.  Her poem is a synergy of ingredients
that gives me a Massachusetts variation of a Rocky Mountain High.

              Line one with its direct statement of the metaphor is
like the first sip of a perfect martini—stirred, not shaken—sipped
from a chilled glass of finest crystal.  Her "tankards of pearl" with
that key word "scooped" trigger an image of fluffy white clouds, due
perhaps to my fondness for ice cream and not to any intention of the
poet. Others will respond with their own images. "Vats upon the
Rhine" generates vowel music that tickles palate and ear and
transports me to Burton-on-Trent and the lively liquor of A. E.
Housman's "Terence, this is stupid stuff," a favorite poem from my
teaching days. Housman was writing about beer, not liquor; still, an
intoxicant's an intoxicant. The first quatrain's half-rhyme of
"pearl" with "alcohol" produces a tang that a perfect rhyme would not
convey.

              Lines 5 and 6 are my favorites, the olive or lemon twist
in the cocktail of my own metaphor. The vowel alliteration of
"Inebriate of air am I" enriches the dictionary meaning, an example
of sound's interplay with sense that epitomizes poetry.  The first
word can be construed as a past participle lacking the concluding
"d," or as a noun. Thus, the line could be paraphrased either as "I
am inebriated by or with air" or "I am an inebriate or habitual
drunkard whose intoxicant is air."  Both ideas are implicit in
Dickinson's shaping of the sentence, and the duality imports a tinge
of drunken confusion and stagger. The exquisite word choice
"debauchee" reinforces the long “e” assonance of "Inebriate" and
alliterates with "dew" to underline the humorous hyperbole that the
poet is an orgiast, in danger of overdosing on dewdrops.  "Reeling"
begins line 7 with a metrical variation, a trochaic substitution in
the established iambic metrical pattern. (Remember your high school
English class?  An iambic foot is an unstressed syllable followed by
one that is stressed, as in "vermouth;" a trochaic foot is the
opposite or reverse, as in "Boodles.")  My head reels, as does the
poetic line. The adjective "molten" is arresting in "Inns of molten
blue."  I discard the image of inns created by a process of heating
something blue until it was liquefied and then pouring it into a
mold, and I settle for summer skies that are molten in the sense of
being heated so that they glow.

              Stanza three makes me giggle tipsily. Bees getting drunk
on nectar and being cut off and tossed out of the Foxglove Pub;
butterflies swearing off spirituous pollen; and a snockered Belle of
Amherst-- all are images that strike my funny bone.  A happy drunk am I!

I have a wee problem with the concluding stanza.  I see seraphs and
saints—regular inhabitants of those heavenly inns but free from
problems of overindulgence or addiction, hustling to the window to
watch Emily stumble out and lean against the sun for balance.
"Little tippler" is another epitome of  sound supporting sense, the
short i's and consonant l's (I'm using consonant as an adjective, not
a noun) sound like someone taking repetitive sips of liquid. I suck
on the pastille trochee "Leaning" in the poem's concluding line, and
taste the giddiness introduced earlier by "Reeling." (Pastilles in a
martini? Metaphorically the spritz of vermouth tempering the icy gin--
Noilly Prat befitting Beefeater.)

I have to hiccup when I swallow "seraphs swing their snowy hats."
I've never pictured a seraph wearing a hat, snowy or otherwise.
Maybe a halo, but I usually reserve those for saints, not angels with
six sets of wings.  Is it another cloud image?  I'm not sure.

              Is that lack of surety the poem's problem?  Is that
something black floating in my cocktail?  Ah, it's just an eyelash,
one of my own.  My fault, not the author/bartender's. I fish it out
and finish the drink.  Good! I'll have another.

Mother's Day Poem
--------------------
copyright john tiong chunghoo
-----------------------------

I know when i was born
your pain was a tempest
love translated decibels
that shove me into world
shrouded, protected,
against rough sea

the love egg never dries
out of you but never out
of your womb of love -
the world you perpetually
work to shield me from
shocks and knocks

you are the moon
that hangs over
my days of darkness
light of warmth
and encouragement
during hours of eclipse

the great decibels have
amplified our bond
the way our voices
echo to us in the mountains

an umbilical cord
ties this heart to you
where severing would
blood our conscience
with guilt and turn
the world against us

last year's mother's day poem here

http://poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poem=999513

Buddha pined at its Feet for Enlightenment
------------------------------------------
copyright john tiong chunghoo

there is a sacredness
in the mountain
as it reaches up to heaven
humbly carrying spirits
in their last leg in reincarnation realm

they are in the trees
in the stones, in every path
in zero thought meditation
to severe desires, umbilical cord
that attach them to pain, suffering

their endeavour throws
a holy presence
and sits in a spot in your core
you would attribute only
to the Sacred One

the mountain's fresh and minted breath
mersmerises, and seeps
through the physique -
a foretaste of nirvana

the trees are the highest
in reincarnation realm
not a sound as they trumpet
their way up the mountain
carrying the Sacred One
higher than the mountain
its hands and finger all
all ready to embrace him

they pass all his tests -
slash it, chop it, burn it, skin it -
they stay calm and quiet
resigning themselves to fate -
proving that they have renounced
all earthy desires

the bodhi gained enlightenment,
took pity and and shared it with Buddha
as he pined at its feet

poets are birds
birds are poets
and the latter
are the truest poets
singing
from dawn till night and night till dawn
crowning the world
with their exuberant,
health giving and never ending poetry slam

first to flag off
the daily slam
would be the cockerels
sending our heart reeling
with the precision of
their poetic clock
they crow until the sun
has no choice but
to rise to the occasion

and then a thousand
other of their kinds
a million colourful plumes
in pomp and pageantry
high on cool shaded
majestic green podiums
begin their rumbunctious slam

their songs as diverse as their shines
every bird chips in
to make their slam the most powerful kind

some squawk,
some squeak
some chip chirp chap
some cry, crow, caw
some whistle, peep, screech
bark, croak, grunt, grumb
some plain quack

the best poets
chirp simple
mersmerising songs
slicing through
the first light
with their varying
tone, scale, metre, rhyme
cheering up the day
with full throated optimism
that could cure
any depressed heart

some twit delightful songs

chirp, chirp, chirp

chit chit chit chit chit chit

chi chiu chiu chiu chiu

twi wee twi wee twi wee

yer er er er eeeeeeeeer

so tenuous
and true
these feather poets
are in their art
they could put their
human cousins
in the novice basket
when it comes to
the world of poetry

john tiong chunghoo

speech - is prank of the snake
power - the trick of the first test
eve falls - and love seals the rest
man with a weak heart falls doubly hard
a whole heaven to - the rescue of his kind

john tiong chunghoo

speech - is prank of the snake
greed the downfall of eve
the man with the weakest heart
falls doubly hard
a whole heaven to the rescue of his kind

john tiong chunghoo inspired by

"Speech"—is a prank of Parliament

"Speech"—is a prank of Parliament—
"Tears"—is a trick of the nerve—
But the Heart with the heaviest freight on—
Doesn't—always—move—

Emily Dickinson

haiku:

dying young
the pain
split roots of an unearthed plant

poem:

to die young
aches the heart
of young and old
it is pulling
the young rose tree
from the ground
its roots ripped
split into halves
a divide between
living and dead
the bruised part
given earth
slowly heals
continues to grow
the other decays
within days
the pain to see
a young goes
never to return
the ache in
the veins
of the heart?
split roots of
an unearthed plant

inspired by

To die

To die--takes just a little while--
They say it doesn't hurt--
It's only fainter--by degrees--
And then--it's out of sight--

A darker Ribbon--for a Day--
A Crape upon the Hat--
And then the pretty sunshine comes--
And helps us to forget--

The absent--mystic--creature--
That but for love of us--
Had gone to sleep--that soundest time--
Without the weariness--

Emily Dickinson

I'd like to second the hello--I'm new as well. I've approached
Dickinson from a personal and an academic viewpoint, and love
analyzing her work and her impact on poetry.

Diana

Hello All,
   Thank you for allowing me to join this group.I'm hoping this group
is much more active than the other forums on Emily Dickinson I have
run across.I am always ready to share thoughts and learn new
information on the poems or the person,a person I came to think of as
a friend that helped me through some very dark days.
   I made a wallpaper for my desktop that I would like to share with
you all.It has been added to the Files page of this group.
                                                         Take care,
                                                                 James

i am greatly inspired by emily dickinson. my ambition is to write a
corresponding poem to each of her poems. this is one of them:

nature is what we dont see
for instance the essence that pushes words out
for this poem fated for posterity
the birds that without fail
chirp at first light, morn breeze
the unseen clock working at the dot
nature is what we dont see
the nocturnal bloom, that folds itself
in the day, throws its fragrance
in the dead of night as lovers
hide in each others' bossoms
below the soft glare of the moon
centimetre by centimetre
it has inched forward to exhibit its
full blown majestry to the world
Nature is what we dont see
the shadow play master tilting the earth
the petals for its bloom dance
the successive cells here there
guided towards optimal functions
and that ogiasmic tremour
that shuttles the world round and round
nature is what you should not see
the formulas, secrets kept behind everything
that could get even einstein mad
in unveiling, explaining them
nature is what we all should not see
nor equipped to see
though it rambles through our every cell
like the worst of storm

john tiong chunghoo

http://poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poem=1124334

inspired by

"Nature" is what we see—
The Hill—the Afternoon—
Squirrel—Eclipse—the Bumble bee—
Nay—Nature is Heaven—
Nature is what we hear—
The Bobolink—the Sea—
Thunder—the Cricket—
Nay—Nature is Harmony—
Nature is what we know—
Yet have no art to say—
So impotent Our Wisdom is
To her Simplicity.

flag
on its own
is limp
downcast,
mere fabric
give him wind
and in a second
it springs to life
to uphold its task
to transport us into
a sea of patriotism
the heel on which
a nation rests
flag on its own
is limp, downcast
give him
a citizen's love,
and it...flies
in their hands,
heart and dreams..
a whole nation
flying on its wings

john tiong chunghoo

angkor wat, angkor thom, bayon
all these thousand year old temples
leave me breathless
the sweat of their builders
that melted down mighty stones
into voluptuous apsaras,
mysterious ramayana bas reliefs
some of which hide faces of builders
upright lions that would trounce
the chinese version in a match,
mystical giant statues that carry smile
more puzzling than mona lisa
and those steep smart flight of stairs
made for courageous khmer kings
to sanctuaries of gods and goddesses
sweep us off our feet
with their ingratiating originality
untainted by today's disturbances
except the power of art and kings
time and tide have brought the
visions of the ancient builders
clearer into sight, stamped the veracity
of their skills onto our soul
Lol, these ancient builders have craved
an angkor onto my heart!

by john tiong chunghoo

would love to welcome everybody to read my haibun
published at mindfire.

http://www.mindfirerenew.com/issue5winter2006/0106-tc.html

comments welcomed.

john tiong chunghoo
also at poemhunter.com

By the way, "Peter Parley" was a series of 18th century children's
storybooks. See
http://www.merrycoz.org/bib/GOODRICH.HTM.
--Jackie

--- In emilyelizabethdickinson@yahoogroups.com, margaret
<windhover_27254@y...> wrote:
>
> Hi myletterworld!
>
> Thanks for reading "I can't tell you...".  Yes... to me it
expresses how difficult - even impossible it is -- for the poet or
for us to express the wonder we feel at spring, nature, or the
mystery behind it all.  I can almost feel the "ecstasty" and sense of
traanscendence in this poem.  I have been wondering about "Peter
Parley" myself.  It seems to possibly be a 'slang' term contemporary
to Dickinson, which would refer to young children's early instruction
(possibly in the 'Catholic' faith?)  I have come across other
Dickinson poems, though don't have the references, where she seems to
use the theme of early childhood instruction (rudiments) to suggest
perhaps that we are really only at that elementary stage of
understanding the mysteries of our existence.   ... my own
interpretation anyway.....!
>
> In the meantime, the poem which begins Johnson's collection is not
in either of my two collections of Dickinson, so I will have to
continue to wait for the "used" edition of same to arrive any day in
the mail.
>
> all the best,
>
> margaret
>
>
>
>
>
> margaret bienert
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Post your free ad now! Yahoo! Canada Personals
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I came looking for this group because of poem #44, and I hope someone
out there is willing to discuss it--especially in its relationship to
poems 40 through 57 (Johnson ed.). In case you don't have the poem:

If she had been the Mistletoe
and I had been the Rose--
How gay upon your table
My velvet life to close--
Since I am of the Druid,
And she is of the dew--
I'll deck Tradition's buttonhole--
And send the Rose to you.

Does anybody think (or know) whether line 4 might have some (if you
will) handographical errors? I'm thinking I might understand it if it
ought to read "so close" or "too close." Any opinions?

--Jackie

welcome to read my mother's day poem and other poems
comments highly welcomed.
http://www.poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poet=63811&poem=999513
best of luck from john tiong chungoo

Free verse: Butterflies
------------------------
women are like butterflies
dad always said when he was alive
oh how true that is
mom, sisters, aunties,
they are all butterflies
with colourful stories
to tell of their wear
and days that flew like honey
cupboards full of
cotton, silk, crepe, nylon,
what have you?
in a million shades and styles
you could see them flying
into a dream
twirl, swirl, twist, waltz, disco
through that memory lane
where diversity is the fruit of life
where a million years might have passed
and you will still be digging in
to feed on those joyous time capsuled moments
transcient as sky blue
big sister loves her graceful skirt in that shade
passionate as rosy red
second sister's favourite blouse
innocent as lily white
third sister's lace covered night gown
so many shades
to talk about butterflies
snappy dad was correct when
he said women are like butterflies
they fly into your life
bringing colours and sweetness
of bloom
if you know where to look for
the right ones and open the heart
of your window wide enough
the butterflies flutter, flap, dances
in so many ways

by john tiong chunghoo
email me at: Bagiruang@...
more poems at:  http://www.poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?
poet=63811&poem=1015935

Little Poem: Alone she puffs
----------------------------
uncertain future, alone she puffs
smoke hides her face
trails the night air
she hides behind
each night under
an inch of powder
lips coloured like roses
the night that aids
accompanies
her cameleon existence
satisfying loners
groping in beds
that witness sea and sea
of swirling passion
shuttling between
excited real and
make-believe passions
to satiate musculine wants
wave and wave of lascivious acts
escalated by teutonic desires
that always end in earthshaking explosions
that rattle the senses
the musty sweaty smell of bedsheets
so familiar now
they feel like home covers
a night away from them
she feels a page
of her favourite book unread
slowly she learns to fit
the regular into irregular mould
to pick up the pieces when she falls
what mom told her long ago
the smoke envelopes her face
before trailing off into the glittering sky
alone she puffs waiting for the next loner
carrying a dream to straighten up her tangled life
in her own tangled ways

by john tiong chunghoo
more poems at http://www.poemhunter.com/john-tiong-
chunghoo/poems/poet-63811/page-1/
plse email me at: bagiruang@...
THANK YOU