The suggested reading list for national education standards is out, and Emily Dickinson dominates. She gets five entries, far more than anyone else. Shakespeare gets three entries. Frost gets two. The entry every broadcast is gonna mention? Mr. Popper's Penguins. Too fun not to say.

But, kids, you know what's not as fun as penguins? Death. You know what Emily Dickinson wrote about all the time? Death. Kids, when she was your age, Emily Dickinson missed all kinds of school, was terribly afraid of death and then she dropped out of college. Happy reading!

For 2nd-3rd graders: "Autumn"

The morns are meeker than they were,
The nuts are getting brown;
The berry's cheek is plumper,
The rose is out of town.

The maple wears a gayer scarf,
The field a scarlet gown.
Lest I should be old-fashioned,
I'll put a trinket on.

Analysis: Autumn, children, means the nearing of death. It never means anything else. You think autumn means the start of school? Ah, well.

For 4th-5th: "A Bird Came Down the Walk"

A bird came down the walk:
He did not know I saw;
He bit an angle-worm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw.

And then he drank a dew
From a convenient grass,
And then hopped sidewise to the wall
To let a beetle pass.

He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all abroad,–
They looked like frightened beads, I thought;
He stirred his velvet head

Like one in danger; cautious,
I offered him a crumb,
And he unrolled his feathers
And rowed him softer home

Than oars divide the ocean,
Too silver for a seam,
Or butterflies, off banks of noon,
Leap, plashless, as they swim.

Analysis: The worm dies! Violently! And you forgot about him already!

For 6th-8th: "The Railway Train"

I like to see it lap the miles,
And lick the valleys up,
And stop to feed itself at tanks;
And then, prodigious, step

Around a pile of mountains,
And, supercilious, peer
In shanties, by the sides of roads;
And then a quarry pare

To fit its sides, and crawl between,
Complaining all the while
In horrid, hooting stanza;
Then chase itself down hill

And neigh like Boanerges;
Then, punctual as a star,
Stop–docile and omnipotent–
At its own stable door.

Analysis: Public school children, God is coming to take you home.

For 9th-10th: "We Grow Accustomed to the Dark"

We grow accustomed to the Dark –
When light is put away –
As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp
To witness her Goodbye –

A Moment — We uncertain step
For newness of the night –
Then — fit our Vision to the Dark –
And meet the Road — erect –

And so of larger — Darkness –
Those Evenings of the Brain –
When not a Moon disclose a sign –
Or Star — come out — within –

The Bravest — grope a little –
And sometimes hit a Tree
Directly in the Forehead –
But as they learn to see –

Either the Darkness alters –
Or something in the sight
Adjusts itself to Midnight –
And Life steps almost straight.

Analysis: What's the "darkness" in this poem? Class? Anyone?

For 12th: "Because I Could Not Stop for Death"

Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.
We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.

We passed the school, where children strove
At recess, in the ring;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

Or rather, he passed us;
The dews grew quivering and chill,
For only gossamer my gown,
My tippet only tulle.

We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.

Since then 'tis centuries, and yet each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.

Analysis: Sigh. How happy is the little stone, kids. Hang in there!

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