Emily Dickinson (1830–86). Complete Poems. 1924. |
Part Two: Nature
CV
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| YOU ’VE seen balloons set, haven’t you? | |
| So stately they ascend | |
| It is as swans discarded you | |
| For duties diamond. | |
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| Their liquid feet go softly out | 5 |
| Upon a sea of blond; | |
| They spurn the air as’t were to mean | |
| For creatures so renowned. | |
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| Their ribbons just beyond the eye, | |
| They struggle some for breath, | 10 |
| And yet the crowd applauds below; | |
| They would not encore death. | |
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| The gilded creature strains and spins, | |
| Trips frantic in a tree, | |
| Tears open her imperial veins | 15 |
| And tumbles in the sea. | |
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| The crowd retire with an oath | |
| The dust in streets goes down, | |
| And clerks in counting-rooms observe, | |
| “’T was only a balloon.” | 20 |
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