Emily Dickinson

Halloween is over, the extra food from our party is gone, and all that is left is to look at pictures and laugh. I had two parties to go to - one on Friday night and then one (at my house) on Saturday night. I didn't want to be the same thing on both nights, but of course I put off costumes until the last minute so they weren't very creative. But it was still fun.

Friday night-basically, for my costume, I just wanted to wear those suspenders, so I tried to be somewhat nerdy. The glasses and those pigtails helped accomplish that... anyway, this is me with Noel (aka the Magic Carpet)

Me and my roommates Saturday night: Pikachu, Ballerina, Scuba Diver. By the way, wearing that ballerina outfit made me feel SO girly, which, if you know me, isn't quite my personality. But it was funny to be out of character.

Reading Poetry

I have a new goal: to read more poetry. As I am starting to think about my honors thesis project of writing a collection of poetry, I want to draw inspiration and ideas from classic poets, such as William Wordsworth and William Blake and William Butler Yeats (what is up with all these great poets named William?!), as well as maybe some Robert Frost and John Greenleaf Whittier and Elizabeth Barrett Browning and whoever else comes to mind. I really like the Romantic-era poets. And I tend to enjoy poetry that has a pastoral (rural) sense to it. I am not generally a huge fan of depressing or pessimistic poetry; I like to read lines that make me feel all warm and happy inside :)

Anyway, the first on my list is Emily Dickinson (mainly because her book was the cheapest at Barnes & Noble since it is one the ones that B&N publishes). It somewhat bothers me that her poems are not titled; titles tell a lot about a poem, especially if the meaning is a little ambiguous. I am not very good at analyzing what I read. Much of the time, I would rather take the poem at face value and not twist it to figure out what possibly the author really meant.

But I wanted to share one of my favorites so far with you:

He ate and drank the precious words,

His spirit grew robust;

He knew no more that he was poor,

Nor that his frame was dust.

He danced along the dingy days,

And this bequest of wings

Was but a book. What liberty

A loosened spirit brings!

I love that Dickinson is describing the effect that reading can have on someone. And I know she most likely was not referring to the Bible, that is what this poem makes me think of. Whenever I read God's Word there is a change that happens in my soul, and I can no longer focus on myself and whatever unpleasant things are happening at the time. There is freedom in the Word of God!

Another poem I like of Emily Dickinson's is "A precious, mouldering pleasure 't is". It personifies an "antique book" as a friend. The second to last stanza says, "He traverses familiar/As one should come to town/And tell you all your dreams were true:/He lived where dreams were born."

JJ Heller

New Christian artist that I love! Her name is a JJ Heller and some of her songs kind of remind me of Ingrid Michaelson. Her music is very mellow and her lyrics are beautiful. One of my favorite songs - and this was really hard to choose which one to put on here - is "All the Beauty." It is somewhat remniscent of BarlowGirl's "Mirror" and Bethany Dillon's "Beautiful."

The last three lines are very convicting in how we as women view ourselves:

I know that you love me enough to die

And I will try to see the value that You place on me

And you say I'm worthy

Last Random Thought

Have I ever mentioned that I love milk? In high school, I drank it all of the time. My mom told me that our family went through four gallons a week... whereas now that I don't live there anymore they barely go through two. I have tried to cut back, since I have to buy my own milk now and that is about $24/month just for milk. I have been going through just one gallon a week until recently, where it hasn't lasted... so tonight I went to the store and gave in and bought two gallons. Oh well. I suppose it's worth it :)