To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee, - One clover, and a bee, And revery. The revery alone will do If bees are few.
To Make a Prairie
Song Cycle by Timothy Hoekman
1. To make a prairie  [sung text not yet checked]
Authorship:
- by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, appears in Poems by Emily Dickinson, first published 1896
See other settings of this text.
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
- GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
2. She sweeps with many‑colored brooms  [sung text not yet checked]
She sweeps with many-colored brooms, And leaves the shreds behind; Oh, housewife in the evening west, Come back, and dust the pond! You dropped a purple ravelling in, You dropped an amber thread; And now you 've littered all the East With duds of emerald! And still she plies her spotted brooms, And still the aprons fly, Till brooms fade softly into stars -- And then I come away.
Authorship:
- by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title
See other settings of this text.
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]3. It sifts from leaden sieves  [sung text not yet checked]
It sifts from leaden sieves, It powders all the wood, It fills with alabaster wool The wrinkles of the road. It makes an even face Of mountain and of plain, - Unbroken forehead from the east Unto the east again. It reaches to the fence, It wraps it, rail by rail, Till it is lost in fleeces; [It flings a crystal veil]1 [On]2 stump and stack and stem, - [The]3 summer's empty room, Acres of [seams]4 where harvests were, Recordless, but for them. It ruffles wrists of posts, As ankles of a queen, - Then stills its artisans like ghosts, Denying they have been.
Authorship:
- by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), appears in Poems by Emily Dickinson, first published 1891
See other settings of this text.
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , copyright © 2019, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
1 Hoekman: "It deals Celestial Vail"
2 Hoekman: "To"
3 Hoekman: "A"
4 Hoekman: "Joints"
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]
4. Two butterflies went out at noon  [sung text not yet checked]
Two butterflies went out at noon And waltzed [above a stream]1, Then stepped straight through the firmament And rested on a beam; And then together bore away Upon a shining sea, - Though never yet, in any port, Their coming mentioned be. If spoken by the distant bird, If met in ether sea By frigate or by merchantman, [Report was not]2 to me.
Authorship:
- by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), appears in Poems by Emily Dickinson, first published 1891
See other settings of this text.
Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , no title, copyright © 2018, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
1 Hoekman: "upon a Farm"
2 Hoekman: "No notice was"
Research team for this page: Emily Ezust [Administrator] , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]