Symphony No. 8
Musical Settings of Poems by
Emily Dickinson
Poems / Movements
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1. Prelude/This world is not conclusion
2. Empty my heart, of thee
3. Within my garden, rides a bird
4. I taste a liquor never brewed
5. It was given me by the Gods
6. They shut me up in prose
7. The sun kept setting setting still
8. How noteless men
9. Homage to Emily
10. I have a king/Let us play yesterday
Poems
Symphony 8-1
This World is not Conclusion
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This World is not Conclusion -
A Species stands beyond -
Invisible, as Music -
But positive, as Sound -
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It beckons, and it baffles -
Philosophy, don't know -
And through a Riddle, at the last -
Sagacity, must go -
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To guess it, puzzles scholars -
To gain it, Men have borne
Contempt of Generations
And Crucifixion, shown -
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Faith slips - and laughs, and rallies -
Blushes, if any see -
Plucks at a twig of Evidence -
And asks a Vane, the way -
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Much Gesture, from the Pulpit -
Strong Hallelujahs roll -
Narcotics cannot still the Tooth
That nibbles at the soul -
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​Symphony 8-2
Empty my heart, of thee
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Empty my Heart, of Thee -
Its single Artery -
Begin, and leave Thee out -
Simply Extinction's Date -
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Much Billow hath the sea -
One Baltic - They -
Subtract Thyself, in play,
And not enough of me
Is left - to put away -
"Myself" meaneth Thee -
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Erase the Root - no Tree -
Thee - then - no me -
The Heavens stripped -
Eternity's vast pocket, picked -
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Symphony 8-3
Within my Garden, rides a bird ​
Within my Garden, rides a Bird
Upon a single Wheel -
Whose spokes a dizzy Music make
As 'twere a traveling Mill -
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He never stops, but slackens
Above the Ripest Rose -
Partakes without alighting
And praises as he goes,
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Till every spice is tasted -
And then his Fairy Gig
Reels in remoter atmospheres -
And I rejoin my Dog,
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And He and I, perplex us
If positive, 'twere we -
Or bore the Garden in the Brain
This Curiosity -
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But He, the best Logician,
Refers my clumsy eye -
To jjust vibrating Blossoms!
An Equisite Reply!
Symphony 8-4
I taste a liquor never brewed
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I taste a liquor never brewed -
From Tankards scooped in Pearl -
Not all the Frankfort Berries
Yield such an alcohol!
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Inebriate of air - am I -
And Debauchee of Dew -
Reeling - thro' endless summer days -
From inns of molten Blue -
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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
Leaning against the - Sun!
Symphony 8-5
It was given to me by the Gods
It was given to me by the Gods -
When I was a little Girl -
They give us Presents most - you know -
When we are new - and small.
I kept it in my Hand -
I never put it down -
I did not dare to eat - or sleep -
For fear it would be gone -
I heard such words as "Rich" -
When hurrying to school -
From lips at Corners of the Streets -
And wrestled with a smile.
Rich! 'Twas Myself - was rich -
To take the name of Gold -
And Gold to own - in solid Bars -
The Difference - made me bold -
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Symphony 8-6
They shut me up in Prose
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They shut me up in Prose -
As when a little Girl
They put me in the Closet -
Because they liked me "still" -
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Still Could themself have peeped -
And seen my Brain - go round-
They might as wise have lodged a Bird
For Treason - in the Pound -
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Himself has but to will
And easy as a Star
Look down upon Captivity -
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And Laugh - No more have I -
Symphony 8-7
The Sun kept setting setting still
The Sun kept setting setting still
No Hue of Afternoon
Upon the Village I perceived
From House to House 'twas Noon
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The Dusk kept dropping dropping still
No Dew upon the Grass
But only on my Forehead stopped
And wandered in my Face
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My Feet kept drowsing drowsing still
My fingers were awake
Yet why so little sound Myself
Unto my Seeming make?
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How well I knew the Light before
I could see it now
'Tis Dying I am doing but
I'm not afraid to know
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Symphony 8-8
How noteless men
How noteless men, and pleiads, stand,
Until a sudden sky
Reveals the fact that one is rapt
Forever from the eye -
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Members of the invisible,
Existing while we stare,
In leagueless opportunity,
O'ertakeless, as the air -
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Why didn't we detain them?
The heavens with a smile,
Sweep by our disappointed heads
Without a syllable -
Symphony 8-9
Homage to Emily
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I have a king who does not speak -
So - wondering - through the hours meek
I trudge the day away -
Half glad when it is night - and sleep -
If, happy, thro' a dream, to peep
In parlors, shut by day.
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And if I do - when morning comes -
It is as if a hundred drums
Did round my pillow roll,
And shouts fill all my childish sky,
And bells keep saying 'Victory'
From steeples in my soul!
Symphony 8-10
I have a king-Let Us play Yesterday
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Let Us play Yesterday -
I - the Girl at school -
You - and Eternity - the
Untold Tale -
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Easing my famine
At my Lexicon -
Logarithm - had I - for Drink -
'Twas a dry Wine -
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Somewhat different - must be -
Dreams tint the Sleep -
Cunning Reds of Morning
Make the Blind - leap -
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Still at the Egg-life -
Chafing the Shell -
When you troubled the Ellipse -
And the Bird fell -
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Manacles be dim - they say -
To the new Free -
Liberty - Commoner -
Never could - to me -
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'Twas my last gratitude
When I slept - at night -
'Twas the first Miracle
Let in - with Light -
Can the Lark resume the Shell -
Easier - for the Sky -
Wouldn't Bonds hurt more
Than Yesterday?
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Wouldn't Dungeons sorer grate
On the Man - free -
Just long enough to taste -
Then - doomed new -
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God of the Manacle
As of the Free -
Take not my Liberty
Away from Me -
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