Hope

I’ve never been much of a poetry reader, but lately, I’ve found myself gratitating toward it. On Saturday, I wandered into a used bookstore in town and came across a small collection of Emily Dickinson’s poetry for 75 cents and snatched it up.

Honestly, I’ve had to read Emily Dickinson in high school and college and I never, not once, understood a bit of her poetry. It all just seemed dark and weird and not pretty, which was basically my only requirement for poetry at that point in life. But after paging through this tiny collection, I still think Dickinson’s work can be dark and weird, but there’s also something real and true about it. Her poems, if anything, are full of emotion and weight.

And as I was paging through the book, I came across a poem called “Hope,” and it became one of my instant favorites. So, I’ll give you a little hope this Monday morning:

Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul, And sings the tune–without the words, And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard; And sore must be the storm That could abash the little bird That kept so many warm.

I’ve heard it in the chillest land, And on the strangest sea; Yet, never, in extremity, It asked a crumb of me.

—Emily Dickinson