The Belle of Amherst wrote more nature poems than you can swing a cat at, but this is one of the best. Also sometimes given the title of “In the Garden.”
A Bird, came down the Walk – (359)
A Bird, came down the Walk –
He did not know I saw –
He bit an Angle Worm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw,
And then, he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass –
And then hopped sidewise to the Wall
To let a Beetle pass –
He glanced with rapid eyes,
That hurried all abroad –
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought,
He stirred his Velvet Head. –
Like one in danger, Cautious,
I offered him a Crumb,
And he unrolled his feathers,
And rowed him softer Home –
Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam,
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon,
Leap, plashless as they swim.
I have always been jealous of Ms. Dickinson, as the she was considered a “no-hoper” in college, because the powers that be thought that her soul, or chance for salvation, was without hope. She left the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary after one year. Her brother was allowed to go to Harvard. Guess which one is remembered now.
Southern Fusion Cooking 