She Who Was Called The Myth

(For Emily Dickinson)

There seem to be a lot

of I’s,

which may be one

of the things we share,

I’d like to think.

Writing about ourselves,

to ourselves,

and why not?

‘tis our closest subject,

and why write poetry,

if one is to make shit up?

Even though when you

write of dawn

I see the night,

somehow,

we may be closely mapped

on the coordinates of time

and space, I imagine.

Did they call you a

bourgeois bitch

when you shut yourself in,

hoping that the walls

of your room will not let you

shut up in prose?

Did you, at last,

feel freer with wood, paper

or ink around you,

than you did with people,

out there?

And in death,

did you, after all, realise

that your verse will remain

alive for me and others

to feed on?

I can never know, for certain,

what was inside your head,

only knowing what is inside

mine.