This collection shows one of the most constant themes throughout Emily Dickinson's poetry -her fascination with mortality. Her unique take on death is that it is universal, inevitable and not to be feared. She describes is so often in terms of joy and relief, using images often of clouds and dawn. In Dickinson's poems, it is a comfort in its inevita-bility. Although she does use religious terms when speaking of it, she doesn't have the typical religious feel around it: there isn't that feeling of escaping endless troubles on Earth to final exaltation in the worship of God. In her poems, it has more of a peaceful serenity to it, nothing grandiose. She doesn't go into disliking life at all, but more that Death is a comforting conclusion to life. Some of the poems were written in response to her losing a friend or family member to death and there is certainly more pain and sadness connected to the loss than any fear when she talks of her own death. As someone who was always quite scared of death as a child and teen, her poems brought me comfort. I was raised in a strict religious upbringing and the afterlife was painted in very specific details along with all the trials and tribulations of life on earth that would precede it. So in reading her poems, I was able to muse about this inevitability with a peace and detachment that I couldn't find anywhere else. In a letter to her cousin, Dickinson wrote: "I believe we shall in some manner be cherished by our Maker- that the One who gave us this remarkable earth has the power still farther to surprise that which He has caused. Beyond that all is silence...". It is that theme -the affection for Earth, the confidence of a peaceful afterlife despite our ignorance of it- that threads through these poems. Reading these poems allows us to feel the serenity of calm in the face of the inevitable, a sense of timelessness in our own limited amount of time. Emma Wallace, Singer-songwriter.

Purchase one of 1st World Library's Classic Books and help support our free internet library of downloadable eBooks. 1st World Library-Literary Society is a non-profit educational organization. Visit us online at www.1stWorldLibrary.ORG - The eagerness with which the first volume of Emily Dickinson's poems has been read shows very clearly that all our alleged modern artificiality does not prevent a prompt appre-ciation of the qualities of directness and simplicity in approaching the greatest themes, - life and love and death. That "irresistible needle-touch," as one of her best critics has called it, piercing at once the very core of a thought, has found a response as wide and sympathetic as it has been unexpected even to those who knew best her compelling power. This second volume, while open to the same criticism as to form with its predecessor, shows also the same shining beauties.

It has often been said that love, both sacred and profane, is the only true subject of the lyric poem. Nothing better justifies this claim than the splendid poems in this volume, which range from the writings of ancient China to those of modern-day America and represent, at its most piercing, a universal experience of the human soul. Includes poems by John Donne, Christina Rossetti, W. H. Auden, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Robert Graves, e. e. cummings, Dorothy Parker, William Shakespeare, Sappho, Bhartrhari, Anna Akhmatova, and W. B. Yeats, among many others.

Rumi has been described as "the most popular poet" in the United States. Rumi's popularity has gone beyond national and ethnic borders. He is considered to be one of the greatest classical poets, by the speakers of Persian language in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. His poetry is still read worldwide today and has been translated into a wide variety of languages including Turkish, Persian, Russian, Asian, English and Spanish languages. Likely due to the pure universal natural themes in his poetry, Rumi's works are simplistic and beautiful at the same time. A collection of 101 quotes of wisdom from Rumi on life, love and happiness. "Anyone who genuinely and consistently with both hands looks for something, will find it. " "Now is the time to unite the soul and the world. Now is the time to see the sunlight dancing as one with the shadows." "Gamble everything for love, if you're a true human being. If not, leave this gathering." "Let the lover be disgraceful, crazy, absentminded. Someone sober will worry about things going badly. Let the lover be." "Why should I be unhappy? Every parcel of my being is in full bloom." ...............

Poetry. Asian Studies. Translated by Larry Smith and Mei Hui Liu Huang. One hundred poems by Japan's great poet Taigu Ryokan (1758-1831) included in English, original Chinese, and in Japanese, translated by poets Mei Hui Liu Huang and Larry Smith. With an introduction, "Taigu Ryokan: Great Fool," by Larry Smith. "These poems, wise and direct, have been rightly treasured for centuries because of the way they expand the mind and refresh the spirit. That is their nature in their original language, and Smith and Huang have managed, with great care and affection, to recreate that nature in English"--David Young, poet and translator.

A wonderfully exuberant yet poignant poetry collection from one of Britain's greatest children's poets Michael Rosen. Here are tales of childhood, from the horrors of being late for school, to making a raft, and going to a cafe, as well as poems to ponder - just think, how great would Satnav trousers be! Touching, light-hearted and funny, Michael's poems will delight readers young and old. Former Children's Laureate, Michael continuously promotes the need for children's poetry in our education system, and this collection, first published in 2010, has something for everyone.