Emily Dickinson was een Amerikaanse dichter uit de 19e eeuw. Tegenwoordig staat ze vooral bekend als een eenzame kluizenaar, maar Emily was zo veel meer dan dit. Ze zat vol met liefde voor haar vrienden en familie, en in het bijzonder voor haar beste vriendin en schoonzus, Susan. Of Emily en Susan een relatie hadden, kom je in deze aflevering van Queerstory achter, waarin ik samen met componist Ymkje de Boer de gedichten van Emily analyseer.

De cello wordt gespeeld door Heleen Wabeke en de zang wordt gedaan door Ymkje de Boer en Miek Smilde. 

Gebruikte gedichten:

I died for beauty

I died for beauty, but was scarce

adjusted in the tomb,

when one who died for truth was lain

in an adjoining room.

He questioned softly why I failed?

"For beauty," I replied.

"And I for truth, -the two are one;

we brethren are," he said.

And so, as kinsmen met a night,

we talked between the rooms,

until the moss had reached our lips, 

and covered up our names

There's been a death in the opposite house

There's been a death in the opposite house 

as lately as to-day. 

I know it by the numb look 

such houses have alway. 

The neighbors rustle in and out, 

the doctor drives away. 

A window opens like a pod, 

abrupt, mechanically; 

Somebody flings a mattress out,-- 

the children hurry by; 

they wonder if It died on that,-- 

I used to when a boy. 

The minister goes stiffly in 

as if the house were his, 

and he owned all the mourners now, 

and little boys besides; 

and then the milliner, 

and the man of the appalling trade, 

to take the measure of the house. 

There'll be that dark parade 

of tassels and of coaches soon; 

it's easy as a sign,-- 

the intuition of the news 

in just a country town.