Favorite Poetry: In a Library

I'm going to honestly confess that, having noticed that I haven't posted in forever, I ambled over to Project Gutenberg and scanned Dickinson poetry until I found something suitable.  My life has been pretty full the past few weeks - and it will continue to be so at least until October - hence the neglect of this blog.  Sorry about that.  But anyway, though I have just discovered it, this is a lovely poem (what poem of Emily Dickinson's isn't, really?) and I'm glad I found it.

In a Library

by Emily Dickinson 

A precious, mouldering pleasure 't is 

To meet an antique book, 

In just the dress his century wore; 

A privilege, I think, 

 His venerable hand to take, 

And warming in our own, 

A passage back, or two, to make 

To times when he was young.

His quaint opinions to inspect, 

His knowledge to unfold 

On what concerns our mutual mind, 

The literature of old; 

What interested scholars most, 

What competitions ran 

When Plato was a certainty. 

And Sophocles a man; 

When Sappho was a living girl, 

And Beatrice wore 

The gown that Dante deified. 

Facts, centuries before, 

He traverses familiar, 

As one should come to town 

And tell you all your dreams were true; 

He lived where dreams were sown.

 

His presence is enchantment, 

You beg him not to go; 

Old volumes shake their vellum heads 

And tantalize, just so.

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