A Lady red, amid the Hill | Affiliated Manuscripts

H 227 (Fr137A)

ca. 1860, winter

Ink | Fair copy

On embossed stationery

Poem-message sent to Susan Gilbert Dickinson.

A Lady red, amid the Hill
Her annual secret keeps.
A Lady white, within the field
In chintz and lily, sleeps.

The tidy Breezes, with their Brooms
Sweep Vale, and hill, and tree –
Prithee, my pretty Housewives!
Who may expected be?

The neighbors do not yet suspect!
The woods exchange a smile!
Orchard, and Buttercup, and Bird
In such a little while!

And yet how still the Landscape stands!
How nonchalant the Hedge!
As if the Resurrection
Were nothing very strange!

                               Emily –

Recipient

Lucretia Gunn Dickinson Bullard (b. 1806–d. 1885)

Dickinson’s paternal aunt.

Inclusive dates of correspondence: 1864. Letters, 3; poems, 2.