Death is like the insect Menacing the tree, Competent to ki… - Emily Dickinson

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Death is like the insect
Menacing the tree,
Competent to kill it,
But decoyed may be.

Bait it with the balsam,
Seek it with the knife,
Baffle, if it cost you
Everything in life.

Then, if it have burrowed
Out of reach of skill,
Ring the tree and leave it, — ’Tis the vermin’s will.

Emily Dickinson

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death poetry

English

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About Emily Dickinson

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (December 10, 1830 – May 15, 1886) was an American poet. Virtually unknown in her lifetime, Dickinson has come to be regarded as one of the greatest American poets of the 19th century. Although she wrote (at latest count) 1789 poems, only a few of them were published in her lifetime, all anonymously, and some perhaps without her knowledge.

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Birth Name: Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

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Lord Byron Edna St. Vincent Millay Alfred Tennyson John Keats Robert Browning

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Life is but life, and death but death! Bliss is but bliss, and breath but breath! And if, indeed, I fail, At least to know the worst is sweet. Defeat means nothing but defeat, No drearier can prevail!

I wish you a kinder sea.

Nature is what we know / Yet have not art to say / So impotent our wisdom is / To her simplicity.

Death is like the insect Menacing the tree, Competent to kill it, But decoyed may be. Bait it with the balsam, Seek it with the knife, Baffle, if it… - Emily Dickinson

About Emily Dickinson

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