I Shall Not Live in Vain

Song Cycle by Alison Bauld (b. 1944)

1. I’m Nobody! Who Are You? [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd [banish us]¹, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell [your]² name the livelong [day]³
To an admiring bog!

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, appears in Poems: Second Series, first published 1891

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , copyright © 2010, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
GER German (Deutsch) (Walter A. Aue) , "Ich bin ein Niemand! Wer bist Du?", copyright © 2006, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , "Io non sono nessuno, e tu?", copyright © 2006, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

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¹ Bacon, G. Coates: "advertise"
² Bacon, G. Coates: "one's"
³ Bacon, G. Coates: "June"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

2. I Measure Every Grief I Meet [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

I measure every Grief I meet 
With narrow, probing, Eyes —
I wonder if It weighs like Mine — 
Or has an Easier size.

I wonder if They bore it long — 
Or did it just begin —
I could not tell the Date of Mine — 
It feels so old a pain —

I wonder if it hurts to live — 
And if They have to try — 
And whether — could They choose between — 
It would not be — to die —

I note that Some — gone patient long — 
At length, renew their smile —
An imitation of a Light 
That has so little Oil —

I wonder if when Years have piled — 
Some Thousands — on the Harm — 
That hurt them early — such a lapse
Could give them any Balm — 

Or would they go on aching still
Through Centuries of Nerve — 
Enlightened to a larger Pain — 
In Contrast with the Love —

The Grieved — are many — I am told —
There is the various Cause —
Death — is but one — and comes but once — 
And only nails the eyes —

There's Grief of Want — and Grief of Cold —
A sort they call "Despair" —
There's Banishment from native Eyes — 
In sight of Native Air —

And though I may not guess the kind — 
Correctly — yet to me
A piercing Comfort it affords
In passing Calvary —

To note the fashions — of the Cross — 
And how they're mostly worn — 
Still fascinated to presume
That Some — are like My Own —

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, written 1863

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Confirmed with Emily Dickinson, Emily Dickinson: Selected Poems and Letters, Broadview Press, 2023, p.44

Researcher for this page: Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

3. The Rat [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

Papa above!
Regard a mouse
O'erpowered by the Cat!
Reserve within thy kingdom
A "Mansion" for the Rat!

Snug in seraphic Cupboards
To nibble all the day,
While unsuspecting Cycles
Wheel [solemnly]¹ away.

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

GER German (Deutsch) (Sharon Krebs) , "Die Ratte", copyright © 2014, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

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Confirmed with The Poems of Emily Dickinson, ed. R.W. Franklin, Volume 1, Cambridge, MA and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1998, Poem 151 (Version B).

¹ In Version A: „ pompously“

Researcher for this page: Sharon Krebs [Senior Associate Editor]

4. The Pedigree of Honey [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

The Pedigree of Honey
Does not concern the Bee --
A Clover, any time, to him,
Is Aristocracy. --

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , "Aristocrazia", copyright © 2009, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

5. I Felt a Funeral in My Brain [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

I felt a funeral in my brain,
  And mourners, to and fro,
Kept treading, treading, till it seemed
  That sense was breaking through.

And when they all were seated,
  A service like a drum
Kept beating, beating, till I thought
  My mind was going numb.

And then I heard them lift a box,
  And creak across my soul
With those same boots of lead, again.
  Then space began to toll

As all the heavens were a bell,
  And Being but an ear,
And I and silence some strange race,
  Wrecked, solitary, here.

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, appears in Poems: Third Series, in 4. Time and Eternity, no. 30, first published 1896

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

CAT Catalan (Català) (Salvador Pila) , "Vaig sentir un funeral al meu cap", copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , copyright © 2008, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
GER German (Deutsch) (Walter A. Aue) , copyright © 2010, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
GER German (Deutsch) (Bertram Kottmann) , copyright © 2015, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , copyright © 2011, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Confirmed with Poems by Emily Dickinson. Third Series, ed by Mabel Loomis Todd, Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1896.

Note: a later edition removes the word "again" from stanza 3, line 3 and adds the following stanza to the end:

And then a plank in reason, broke,
And I dropped down and down —
And hit a world at every plunge,
And finished knowing — then —

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

6. I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

I heard a Fly buzz -- when I died -- 
The Stillness in the Room
Was like the Stillness in the Air -- 
Between the Heaves of Storm.

The Eyes around -- had wrung them dry -- 
And Breaths were gathering [sure]¹
For that last Onset -- when the King
Be witnessed -- in the Room -- 

I willed my Keepsakes -- Signed away
What portion of me be
Assignable -- and then it was
There interposed a Fly -- 

With Blue -- uncertain stumbling Buzz -- 
Between the light -- and me -- 
And then the Windows failed -- and then
I could not see to see --

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, first published 1896

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

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See also Anna Clyne's setting "Between the Rooms"

¹ Rusche: "firm"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

7. Wild Nights [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

Wild nights! -- Wild nights!
Were I with thee,
Wild nights should be
Our luxury!

Futile -- the [Wind]¹ --
To a heart in port, --
Done with the Compass, --
Done with the Chart!

Rowing in Eden --
Ah! the Sea!
Might I but moor -- Tonight --
In thee!

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, appears in Poems: Second Series, first published 1891

See other settings of this text.

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

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¹ note: sometimes "Winds". Harmer, Hoiby, Leisner, Rusche, A. Thomas: "Winds"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

8. If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain;
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin
Unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.

Text Authorship:

by Emily Dickinson (1830 - 1886), no title, appears in Poems of Emily Dickinson, first published 1890

See other settings of this text.

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

Total word count: 643