Savvy 2: Emily Dickinson

The last gift my grandmother gave me before she died was a volume of the complete poems of Emily Dickinson. Her hand shook as she tried to balance the book on her knees in the hospital bed, so her signature is wobbly and intentionally structured, like a child's first lines of cursive. It seemed an odd gift to me at the time, as I wasn't yet a great fan of Emily Dickinson. (I preferred Ogden Nash - easier to memorize, and more bang for the syllable). But it was on that day for the first time that someone in my family thought of me as a writer, and for that reason alone, for many years, I carted this absurdly heavy version of Emily Dickinson off to every destination.

Today when I opened the book to look up a poem, I found two soft orange velvet Ps. My varsity letters from Princeton. I suppose they are there for safe-keeping, in the arms of what I will always be, to remind me of what I once was.

In any event, here is a quote from Emily Dickinson for today that resonates for me:

A word is dead/When it is said/Some say.
I say/It just begins to live/That day.

It is a dream of mine that Savvy Wordsmith will bring to light some of lingering stories from those whose hands have begun to shake, who are ready to let their words live.