Sonnet: To Emily Dickinson - Poem by S. J. Fulton

She speaks for those who cannot speak at all,
For those upon whom fate and chance have fed,
Yet whose mute hearts since the Couple’s fall
Have sought the golden apples, not the red.
She writes for those whose maimed and shriveled hands,
Hammered to the cross of everyday,
Cannot reach out to turn the showering sands
Of time. But is it only clever play?
Can I presume that she has fairly sung
The life-long turns of fortune’s wax and wane?
Has she some searing gift of pen and tongue
To voice the silences of joy and pain?
To try and sometimes fail, that does no wrong.
I could not live one day without her song.