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Happy 195th Birthday, Emily Dickinson!

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My Creative Retirement Institute class on Emily Dickinson’s fascicles wrapped up yesterday. The beauty (and the weirdness) of it was that focusing on the fascicles made it impossible for me to turn the class into “all of Bethany’s favorite E. D. poems.” In each class I asked, “What caught your eye? What do you want to bring to our attention?” As a result, we put a microscope to poems I’ve barely given a glance in the past. And everything we picked up gave us so much to talk about. It was ideal.

Today I’m having my writing group here, at my house. I’ll bake Emily’s Coconut Cake, and we’ll drink sparkling water, and read poems to one another. What could be better?

https://revolutionarypie.com/2015/01/14/emily-dickinsons-coconut-cake/

Celebrations are popping up everywhere on the Web, but here are two that made their way to my in-box:

Pádraig Ó Tuama’s On Being newsletter: https://poetryunbound.substack.com/p/you-cannot-extinguish (my only quibble with his post is that he says Dickinson bound her fascicles to send to correspondents, and though she mailed many poems with letters, I don’t believe there’s evidence for the fascicles being shared). He describes her poems and letters as a tribute and reminder of what “a deep pursuit of a vocation can do.” True!

And of course the Emily Dickinson Museum—visit this site today to see all the hoopla (including a virtual program, which you, too, can join via their registration link): https://www.emilydickinsonmuseum.org

And, do I have favorite Dickinson poems? Oh, so many!

I taste a liquor never brewed –
From Tankards scooped in Pearl –
Not all the Frankfort Berries
Yield such an Alcohol!

Inebriate of air – am I –
And Debauchee of Dew –
Reeling – thro’ endless summer days –
From inns of molten Blue –

When “Landlords” turn the drunken Bee
Out of the Foxglove’s door –
When Butterflies – renounce their “drams” –
I shall but drink the more!

Till Seraphs swing their snowy Hats –
And Saints – to windows run –
To see the little Tippler
From Manzanilla come!

(Fascicle 12, Sheet 1, c. early 1861, Miller p. 135)

 

Tomorrow evening, Dec. 11, 2025, at 6 p.m., I’m one of three featured readers at It’s About Time in Ballard. You can expect me to talk a bit about Dickinson (just try to stop me!), and to share a handful of my Dickinson-inspired poems.

 

Emily Dickinson and the Mystery of the 40 Fascicles

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This post was supposed to go up on Halloween, but let’s settle for Day of the Dead. In short, I’m preparing to teach another Creative Retirement Institute course on Emily Dickinson, this one titled “Emily Dickinson and the Mystery of the 40 Fascicles,” which to my mind has a nice Arabian Nights or maybe Nancy Drew vibe to it. As you might guess, one of our objects will be to discuss the poems in the context of the fascicles, including this poem, “One need not be a chamber – to be Haunted – ” which is found in Fascicle Twenty.

Read to the end of the post (or skip down there) to see more information about the course.

One need not be a chamber – to be Haunted –
One need not be a House –
The Brain – has Corridors surpassing
Material Place –                                              Corporeal [Place – ]

Far safer of a Midnight – meeting
Eternal Ghost –
Than an Interior – confronting –
That cooler – Host –                                       That Whiter Host.

Far safer, through an Abbey – gallop –
The Stones a’ chase –
Than moonless – One’s A’self encounter –
In lonesome place –

Ourself – behind Ourself – Concealed –
Should startle – most –
Assassin – hid in Our Apartment –
Be Horror’s least –

The Prudent – carries a Revolver –                The Body [carries] the
He bolts the Door –
O’erlooking a Superior Spectre –
More near –

—Emily Dickinson,  c. Autumn 1862

(Miller, p. 217)

You can listen to me read our haunted poem here:

 

I want to fill in some background for where my ideas for this course originated.

from emilydickinsonmuseum.org

Two years ago, I was invited to audit Professor Cristanne Miller’s U of Buffalo graduate seminar focusing on the, at that time, not-yet-released Letters of Emily Dickinson—the first new edition in 70 years, much needed—edited by Miller and Domnhall Mitchell.

I attended the class via Zoom, of course, and my anonymity allowed me to resist buying one more edition of Dickinson’s poems. I got by with Thomas H. Johnson’s 1971 one-volume Selected Letters, his 1961 one-volume Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, and Ralph Franklin’s 1999 reader’s edition, The Poems of Emily Dickinson. All of which were already on my big shelf of Dickinson books. After the seminar ended, convinced of their necessity, I bought both the poems and the letters.

I want to emphasize this: An important feature of Emily Dickinson’s Poems: As She Preserved Them, also edited by Miller, is contained in the subtitle. We can, finally, in a one-volume, reader’s edition, see Dickinson’s fascicles, the little booklets into which she arranged her poems from 1858 to 1865. Dickinson’s variant words, too (see margin notes) are included in this edition.

After these gorgeous new editions sat on my shelf for several months, it occurred to me that I might actually read them.

From there I conceived of a project called “My Year of Reading Dickinson.” Last November, before my year officially began, I told my friend, poet and scholar Jayne Marek, that I had no idea what it should look like. Though I hoped to share the project in some fashion, it felt lumpy and shapeless. Jayne suggested that I just put my boots on and get started. “Read for a few months or the whole year, then decide what it is.”

As you know, this past year a bunch of other stuff took over much space in my haunted brain, but even on the absolute worst days, I have picked up the letters and read a page or two, and I have read at least a few poems—usually more. Because I get up at dark-thirty and my husband rises at 8:00, I had time for this. (More than once I’ve awakened at midnight, realized I hadn’t done my pages, and got out of bed to do so.) I can now report that I’ve finished both volumes, and am circling back to reread and make more notes.

Speaking of that long shelf of books about E. D., I have also tried to keep a biography or critical work going on the side. And I have shared a little. Last winter’s Creative Retirement Institute course on Dickinson, for instance. I will share more, though I’m still not sure what that sharing will look like. Blog posts? A new blog, dedicated to Dickinson? Or will I venture into the Substack world? For now, I’ll be pouring a lot into the class, and mining the discussion for possibilities.

So all that blather, only to circle back to the beginning of the post. I’d love to see you join us for the CRI course. It’s on Zoom and runs 4 Tuesdays, 2 hours per class, beginning November 18. Jump straight to the course from the above link, or check out CRI’s catalog here.

 

Year’s End

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It is New Year’s Eve — though this will post as January 1. Anyway, just a few thoughts to wrap up 2024 here at A Habit of Writing.

BUYING BOOKS?

Earlier this year, a reader asked me, Where do you find your books? The library, I think I said, or friends give them to me, or people send me a book with a request for a review. Thriftbooks.com is a good source when I need to purchase a book.

Well, forget that. This year I lost my mind and spent a ton of money on poetry books.

I’ve read a couple of these (see pic) — I have reviewed none.

My best excuse is that it was self-soothing behavior. Remember my spring CRI course, “Good Poetry for Hard Times”? Months ago I was already freaked out about the election, about Ukraine and Gaza, about climate change, and so on (and on).

Unsubscribing from a number of news feeds has helped. And poetry has helped. As a nutritionist once said to me, Why do we crave comfort food? Because we need comfort. At least there are no calories involved in reading poetry.

POETRY SUBMISSIONS

Not much to report this year. I began in September to send work out, but it was a half-hearted attempt and has not, so far, resulted in one single acceptance. I can report that I was invited to submit to several venues, and those poems found homes. More in 2025 when they are published.

THE POOR NEGLECTED BLOG

We will not feel too sorry for the blog — I came close to posting every week this year, and wrote a number of book reviews that appeared here, and elsewhere.

I did NOT do a good job keeping up the list of publications (see my CV tab). In March I contacted my webmaster and we made plans for new pictures, some new formatting, etc. — I had high hopes! — and then that fell flat, too. Somehow, the energy never appeared.

Voracious Reading and Writing, in General

I mean, I do after all have a Ph.D. in literature, and — from girlhood on — “reader” has always been the main listing on my calling card. So if this is my year-end brag post I should let you know I read more than poetry. I read mystery novels, of course (research!).

I also read some literary novels: Haven by Emma Donoghue, Hard by a Great Forest by Leo Vardviashvilli, Pearl by Siân Hughes (a debut novel by a poet! it took her 20 or 30 years to write! I think we might be twins separated at birth!), and Whale Fall by Elizabeth O’Connor. I reread Bring Up the Bodies by the late great Hilary Mantel. I’m happy to recommend any of these.

As for writing — that continues, every day. I am within a week or so (maybe a month) of having my second mystery novel ready for beta readers. I’ve also kept up with my poem-a-week practice. (Not that all the poems are “good” poems.) I think I’m on the verge of cobbling together the next poetry book. We will see.

TEACHING / COACHING

Now, this category, I can brag on. I worked with two poets in 2023 and 2024, and each of them has a book coming out, early in 2025. I reviewed John Egbert’s book here. I’ll review the other when I have the final ms. in my hands.

I already mentioned my first Creative Retirement Institute (CRI) class, and I am happy to report that my two proposals for 2025 courses have been accepted.

Winter quarter: “Emily Dickinson in the 21st Century”

Spring Quarter: “May Swenson and Friends”

CRI courses are inexpensive, and the whole catalog is worth a look. I highly recommend them.

My CRI offerings are sort of low-key lit courses, but I’m thinking about running my own zoom writing workshop alongside. I’ll keep the cost very low (in keeping with the doable cost of CRI courses). Contact me soon if you have a specific request about days and times.

Labyrinth at St. Hilda’s / St. Patrick’s Episcopal Church

So that’s it — soon I WILL update the blog, including my list of publications. And you can expect me to be back in 2025 with more reviews of good poetry. For hard times, and for joyful times, too.

J. I. Kleinberg, DESIRE’S AUTHORITY

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DESIRE’S AUTHORITY, J. I. Kleinberg, from Triple No. 23. Ravenna Press, Edmonds, Washington, 2023, pp. 61-80, paper, $12.95. http://ravennapress.com.

Last Saturday, I slipped away from the Chuckanut Writers Conference to attend a reading, at Dakota Art in downtown Bellingham, featuring Anita K. Boyle, Sheila Sondik, and J. I. Kleinberg. Yes, the conference was wonderful, with a plethora of good stuff on offer, but the trifecta of these voices, plus their art, was too great a temptation. I’m so glad I was able to be there.

Kleinberg read from several books, including her Dickinson inspired chapbook of collage poems, Desire’s Authority, published last year by Ravenna Press. I’ve been on a book-buying binge (a binge that seriously has to stop) but this book I already had in my possession. So, once I was home, I went through my TBR pile of poetry books and found it.

Take all the serendipity of how I stumbled into this happy accident, and times it by three, and you have Triple No. 23 (also featuring chapbooks by Michelle Eames and Heikki Huotari).

Kleinberg’s collage poems, alone, are all about serendipity, juxtaposition, and happy accidents.  She creates them by cutting apart words found in magazines—if it sounds a bit like ransom demands, you’re not wrong. Not demanding in the sense of difficulty, but definitely willing to hold your attention hostage. In the author’s note Kleinberg reveals how she came up with her collage series (which is extensive, and not only this set of poems):

Through the accident of magazine page design, unrelated words fell into proximity to cast unintended meaning across the boundaries of sentence, paragraph, and column break. Leaving behind the words’ original sense and syntax, I collected these contiguous fragments of text, each roughly the equivalent of a poetic line. Arrayed on my worktable, they began to talk with one another and assume a new shape of visual poems. —J. I. Kleinberg (p. 89)

Gaps, fragments, the hop from one word or phrase to the next like hopping stone to stone across a creek, the occasional precarious drop—these found poems are a visual and poetic delight. I can’t decide on a water metaphor or fire to best describe them. Either way, I love these poems in part for how they invite a reader’s imagination into their creation. If there’s sometimes a little groping to find a shutter or door to throw open, a match to light, the illumination comes.

You can learn more about Kleinberg’s collage poems—and see examples—at her blog, Chocolate Is a Verb. She is also the curator of The Poetry Department, which delivers one poetry event, quotation, or other enticing poetry-related discovery every day.

 

borrowed from Judy’s blog, a photo from the exhibit, “Ink, Paper, Scissors: nature speaks in three voices”