# Please Help Me Find an Emily Dickinson Poem **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 5, 2009, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404 "2009-08-05T09:56:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Talon\_Karrde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Talon\_Karrde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Talon_Karrde)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/1 "2009-08-05T09:56:24Z")
It’s about a man looking back on his life and regretting not having taken any chances, including I think telling a woman he loves her. I think there was also a metaphor about sailing, but I don’t remember it too well. I read it years ago and have been trying to find it. Google hasn’t given me anything good. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/2 "2009-08-05T12:22:17Z")
Are you sure it’s Dickinson? She didn’t usually write from the male point of view and rarely wrote about love. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/3 "2009-08-05T12:24:36Z")
Perhaps you’re thinking of Millay? ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/4 "2009-08-05T14:40:25Z")
If it is Dickinson (which I doubt), you can search [this database](http://www.bartleby.com/113/) for it. ---
**Author:** ![Nametag](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nametag/32/406_2.png) [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)\ **Post date:** [August 5, 2009, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/5 "2009-08-05T18:52:12Z")
Well, there’s _Wild Nights_: > [@](#): > > Wild Nights! Wild Nights! > Were I with thee, > Wild Nights should be > Our luxury! > > Futile the winds > To a heart in port, – > Done with the compass, > Done with the chart! > > Rowing in Eden! > Ah! the sea! > Might I but moor > To-night in Thee! ---
**Author:** ![Talon\_Karrde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Talon\_Karrde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Talon_Karrde)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2009, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/6 "2009-08-06T07:20:28Z")
It’s not Wild Nights. It might not have been from a male point of view, but I’m thinking it’s probably not Emily Dickinson because it was fairly memorable and someone would have thought of it by now. I’ll try googling some more and seeing what I can find. ---
**Author:** ![Talon\_Karrde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Talon\_Karrde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Talon_Karrde)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2009, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/7 "2009-08-06T07:25:58Z")
Aha! I found it! It’s [George Gray](http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/george-gray/) by Edgar Lee Masters. All this time I had thought it was Emily Dickinson who wrote the poems about dead people. I don’t know how I got them mixed up. Maybe I was studying them at the same time in high school or something. ---
**Author:** ![Humble\_Servant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/47e85d/32.png) [@Humble\_Servant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Humble_Servant)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2009, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/8 "2009-08-06T14:58:33Z")
Heh. “Poems about dead people,” also known as the Spoon River Anthology. The concept is a poem for each citizen buried in a small town graveyard. They talk a lot about each other. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2009, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/9 "2009-08-06T17:39:07Z")
“Poems about dead people” would have been a pretty good clue. ---
**Author:** ![AppallingGael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9bd4f/32.png) [@AppallingGael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AppallingGael)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2009, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/please-help-me-find-an-emily-dickinson-poem/505404/10 "2009-08-06T19:19:41Z")
I would have guessed Whittier’s “[Maud Muller](http://bartleby.com/102/76.html)” (“of all sad words of tongue or pen/ the saddest are these: ‘it might have been’)” or Tennyson’s [_In Memoriam_ (too long but “better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all”.