Best Poem of All Time According to Google

[CMatthews]

I Cannot Live With You
by Emily Dickinson

I cannot live with you,
It would be life,
And life is over there
Behind the shelf

The sexton keeps the key to,
Putting up
Our life, his porcelain,
Like a cup

Discarded of the housewife,
Quaint or broken;
A newer Sevres pleases,
Old ones crack.

I could not die with you,
For one must wait
To shut the other's gaze down,
You could not.

And I, could I stand by
And see you freeze,
Without my right of frost,
Death's privilege?

Nor could I rise with you,
Because your face
Would put out Jesus'.
That new grace

Glow plain and foreign
On my homesick eye,
Except that you, than he
Shone closer by.


Uh, I really don't understand this. Could someone explain it
to me and others.

Carolyn

 

[greenmountaineer]

Great on line interpretation of a great poem:

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/cantlive.html

I don't know of a poet who mastered irony as well as she did. My favorite is "I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died."

 

[bflagsst]

I think she means 'Why is this poem considered the greatest poem?'? If it's the best poem of all time according to Google, I'd go find whoever chose it and ask them why they chose it.

It's a great poem. But it's really second-rate to Sonnet 43 by E. B.-Browning. Her poem is the greatest because of the lines:

I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints.

-In terms of describing a indescribable feeling, there's really nothing as clear and as eloquently put; that I've seen anyway. I like how it's almost anti-religious in Church purview, but religious in a really human way. The best poems are risque in the time they are produced. The Emily poem has that same almost heretic tinge to it.

 

[butters]

I Cannot Live With You
by Emily Dickinson

I cannot live with you,
It would be life,
And life is over there
Behind the shelf

The sexton keeps the key to,
Putting up
Our life, his porcelain,
Like a cup

Discarded of the housewife,
Quaint or broken;
A newer Sevres pleases,
Old ones crack.

I could not die with you,
For one must wait
To shut the other's gaze down,
You could not.

And I, could I stand by
And see you freeze,
Without my right of frost,
Death's privilege?

Nor could I rise with you,
Because your face
Would put out Jesus'.
That new grace

Glow plain and foreign
On my homesick eye,
Except that you, than he
Shone closer by.


Uh, I really don't understand this. Could someone explain it
to me and others.

Carolyn

maybe it was a matter of votes received and a limited option of pieces to vote for? a bit like the nominations for Oscars and stuff

 

[champagne1982]

Well, much of this poem's greatness lies in the language of the time it was written in. You have to understand the role of a sexton, need the info that Sevres refers to a china and porcelain company, and have the same ideas of faith and morality.

Apart from that, I love the rhythm and the simple idea that is presented in this poem--I am not worthy of you because you are perfect.

 

[Palba_Noruda]

i prefer missy elliott

Missy be a freak,
Sex so good, I can freak you in my sleep,
Ice on my sleeve, I can make a room freeze,
Pockets more bigger than a stripper booty cheeks,
Dudes don't speak when they look at my physique,
French on my feet, cost about fifty,
I don't swing from a pole, Missy swing from a tree,
I'm Mohamed Ali, cause I can sting like a bee,
Whatchu know about that,
So cute and fat,
Let him hit it once, and watch the dude come back,
Cause the back so stacked, it's like sittin' on a jack,
Missy be a mack, that's a true fact

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Missy be a freak,
Sex so good, I can freak you in my sleep,
Ice on my sleeve, I can make a room freeze,
Pockets more bigger than a stripper booty cheeks,
Dudes don't speak when they look at my physique,
French on my feet, cost about fifty,
I don't swing from a pole, Missy swing from a tree,
I'm Mohamed Ali, cause I can sting like a bee,
Whatchu know about that,
So cute and fat,
Let him hit it once, and watch the dude come back,
Cause the back so stacked, it's like sittin' on a jack,
Missy be a mack, that's a true fact

I don't know how you could even put that into comparison with the first poem but each to their own I suppose

 

[EroticOrogeny]

I don't know how you could even put that into comparison with the first poem but each to their own I suppose

I second that.
Not sure Emily's would get my vote, would have to read quite q bit more than I have lately (which I really should make an effort to do soon).

 

[Epmd607]

Google's telling me some Sara Teasdale poems are the greatest of all time. I always figured she was a poor man's Emily Dickinson. Maybe more like a rich man's imitation Emily Dickinson. Emily deserves her place in the canon, but I don't think that any individual poem of hers stands out as much as a 'Do Not Go Gentle' or 'Girl Lithe and Tawny'.

 

[Palba_Noruda]

I don't know how you could even put that into comparison with the first poem but each to their own I suppose

LOL just foolin' around

 

[Heather_Lee]

Well, much of this poem's greatness lies in the language of the time it was written in. You have to understand the role of a sexton, need the info that Sevres refers to a china and porcelain company, and have the same ideas of faith and morality.

Apart from that, I love the rhythm and the simple idea that is presented in this poem--I am not worthy of you because you are perfect.

Such wonderful understanding of the poem's greatness! I would also say that a second idea presented is that the world works to keep lovers apart.