The Yellow Rose of Amherst

Didja know...

that most of Emily Dickinson's poems may be sung to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas?"

It's true! Just give it a try. (If you don't know the tune, there is a midi file here.)

Some especially fun poems to sing this way are "Because I Could Not Stop for Death" and "I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died."

By the way, this is not a discovery I made on my own. One of my favorite professors, Duke Rank, shared this bit of extemporanea with my Am Lit I class a while back. It's one of those things you wish you'd never known, because once you do, you'll never forget.

NEWS FLASH! (added 14 August 2001)

Apparently, not only is the fact that Emily be sung to "TYRoT" old news, but there are many *other* popular tunes her verse can be set to:

Amazing Grace
America (medley -- 1st song is "America")
Auld Lang Syne
Beverly Hillbillies Theme
Gilligan's Island Theme
Ghost Riders in the Sky
The House of the Rising Sun
It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
What Child is This
Yankee Doodle

Go ahead. Try it. You know you want to. (Sigh.)

poem 465

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 firm

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--

poem 27

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 played,
Their lessons scarcely done;
We passed the fields of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.

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; but each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.

Note to Andrew: You know, of course, that this knowledge means trouble ahead... (Lucky for you that I have the memory of a lab rat!)

Return to Katharine's Home Page.

e-mail me

graciously hosted by