d and her poetic techniques were conventional. But she later began to attend to the visual aspects of her poems. For example, she arranged and broke lines of verse in unusual ways and she created extravagantly shaped letters of the alphabet to emphasize a poem's meaning. She also added cutouts from novels, magazines, and even the Bible to augment her own use of language. Although few of Emily's poems were formally published during her lifetime, she was able to self "publish" by sending out at least one-third of her poems in more than 1000 letters she wrote to at least 100 different correspondents. Emily's method of binding about 800 of her poems into 40 manuscript books and distributing several hundred of them in letters are now widely recognized as her particular form of self-publication. She also read her poems aloud to several people, including her cousins Louise and Frances Norcross, over a period of three decades. Poem #508 ( I'm Ceded)I'm ceded -- I've stopped being Their's -- 1The name They dropped upon my face With water, in the country church Is finished using, now, And They can put it with my Dolls, 5My childhood, and the string of spools, I've finished threading -- too -- Baptized, before, without the choice, But this time, consciously, of Grace -- Unto supremest name -- 10Called to my Full -- The Crescent dropped -- Existence's whole Arc, filled up, With one small Diadem.My second Rank -- too small the first -- Crowned -- Crowing -- on my Father's breast --15 A half unconscious Queen -- But this time -- Adequate -- Erect, With Will to choose, or to reject, And I choose, just a Crown -- Upon a first reading of Emily Dickinson's poems I found them very difficult to understand due to her unique style of writing. Once I was able to comprehend the general theme of her poems, they became clearer with profound meaning. Emily's writing style, leaving words absent and not completing sentences, allows the reader to fill in the gaps th...
