POETRY During the years when the short story was in the ascendancy, the poetic field was

comparatively barren. One "last pale Indian-summer flower of Puritanism" was blossoming in its retired shade, unnoticed until late but giving forth a fragrance that was to inspire the poets who were to follow. The reference is, of course, to Emily Dickinson 1830-1886), a sensitive soul, whose concentrated bits of verse marked her during the 'nineties, a precursor of the "imagists." Miss Dickinson, save for one tragic attachment, in which the lovers "scrupled to take their bliss at another's cost," lived a cloistered existence. Driven in upon herself, she found relief in verse of rare insight and pungency. She recorded, with a mind at once daring and navely responsive to the simplest things, the whims and fancies of that inner life, its child-like aphorisms, its startling excursions into another world, its lyric cry of the heart. To her, the verses were too sacred to give to the public, but with their publication since her death they have found secure popular favor.