A Death blow is a Life blow to Some by Emily Dickinson

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A Death blow is a Life blow to Some

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A Death blow is a Life blow to Some
Who till they died, did not alive become—
Who had they lived, had died but when
They died, Vitality begun.

Emily Dickinson

Read poems about / on: death, life

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Gary Witt (9/21/2006 10:04:00 AM)
A few random thoughts.

1. A friend once told me the best advice his father ever gave him was to live life as if it were your second chance.

2. An obvious message here is that some people do not live until they have come close to death. A more subtle message is that there are those who are not appreciated by the living until after they have died. Their vitality does not begin until they are appreciated posthumously.

3. The phrase 'life blow' calls to mind the first swat given to a newborn by the doctor. I wonder if they still do that. Has the image I have so clearly in mind-of a doctor holding a newborn upside down by the feet and slapping it across the butt to make it cry-become an anachronism?

John Tiong Chunghoo (3/26/2006 2:15:00 AM)
the miser
he let money drive
him to death

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