Why Bloggers Blog: Part III-B

To Practice Using Lasting Words

This is my letter to the world,
That never wrote to me,

The simple news that Nature told,

With tender majesty.
Her message is committed

To hands I cannot see;

For love of her, sweet countrymen,

Judge tenderly of me!

Emily Dickinson

I'm nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody, too?

Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!

They'd advertise - you know!
How dreary to be somebody!

How public like a frog

To tell one's name the livelong day

to an admiring bog!

Emily Dickinson

If Emily Dickinson had added an "L" to that last word "bog," she would be known as both a poet and a prophet in "bLog" circles. Even still, I hereby move that she be considered an honorary blogger (lacking only the technology that would come 1oo+ years later). After reading the two "posts" above, don't you wish you could leave her a comment?

But alas, the only "posts" her more than 1,800 entries saw were her bed posts. After her death, hundreds and hundreds of poems were found bundled with ribbon under her bed and in her bedside bureau. Only a handful were published (anonymously) during her lifetime.

She did "blog" a few of her musings (by handwritten letter) to a well-know editor of the time, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, but in his "comments" back to her he advised her not to publish them. He kindly thought they were a bit odd.

Through the years Emily and Thomas continued a friendship by mail. He once asked her to define poetry because he could simply not figure out many of her "posts." She wrote in her next entry: "If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?" I've read no better answer on his part.

.

She took her friend's advice but continued privately "blogging" on scraps of paper tucked out of public view. The quiet "blogger" once consoled herself that publishing her work would be like auctioning off her mind [which captures the fear all writers have that their work would find no bidders]. As she gave up on publishing, her life became more eccentric and reclusive. Ironically, sometime after her death on May 15, 1886, it was Higginson who published her poems.

As Miss Dickinson's world in Amherst, Massachusetts, began closing in around her, the Civil War was expanding in the states to her south. Just as Emily Dickinson's "letters to the world" were tucked away in obscurity, thousands of other letters never meant for public eyes were being mailed across the battle lines.

The topic of Part III-B is the enduring nature of well-chosen words. The samples are from personal unpublished writings that reflect the author's understanding that the patterns of ink coming from their pen may likely be read after they are gone. The letters below were not written to us and must be opened with the solemnity of the times and circumstances that prompted them:

Perhaps the most eloquent example is the letter from Sullivan Ballou to his wife, written July 14, 1861:

My very dear Sarah:
The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days.... Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more....Not my will, but thine 0 God, be done. If it is necessary that I should fall on the battlefield for my country, I am ready. … I am willing - perfectly willing - to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government….

But, my dear wife, when I know that with my own joys I lay down nearly all of yours, and replace them in this life with cares and sorrows…. my unbounded love for you, my darling wife and children, [struggles] in fierce, though useless, contest with my love of country.

I cannot describe to you my feelings on this calm summer night, when two thousand men are sleeping around me, many of them enjoying the last, perhaps, before that of death -- [as I] am communing with God, my country, and thee….

Sarah, my love for you is deathless....I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me - perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar -- that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name.

Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have oftentimes been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortune of this world, to shield you and my children from harm. But I cannot. I must watch you from the spirit land and hover near you…and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more.

But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the garish day and in the darkest night -- amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours - always, always; and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; or the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. Sarah, do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again.
Sullivan

Within a week, before the letter reached home, this loving husband and father was killed in battle. When time allows, read the complete story and letter here. (The photo of a letter above is from an Iowan to his family.)

Here is a letter from a Virginian on a battle field who wished to tell his wife the story of how he fell in love with her. His affections for her began when she was only eight and he was twice her age. The story unfolds with honor and propriety, and they eventually marry. Here are some letters form other Virginians. If you find these "last and lasting words" fascinating to read, this site had many more love letters from the Civil War. They do not all contain the sentiments of Sullivan Ballou, but they all reflect an urgency to be remembered through a note. They issue forth from hearts to which those who would read the words have never mattered more.

.

No discussion of Civil War eloquence would be complete without touching on Abraham Lincoln. We of course know him for his Gettysburg Address, which to me is sheer poetry, and his sad farewell to his friends at Springfield, who would a few years later welcome his tall, lean frame home for burial. After reading his brief letter to Mrs. Bixby, you'll see why I have chosen to close with it.

.

Lincoln’s letter to Mrs. Bixby Mrs. Bixby, Boston, Massachusetts:

DEAR MADAM: I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.

Yours very sincerely and respectfully,

Abraham Lincoln

.

Thank you for reading this long post through to the end. Perhaps it may inspire some bloggers to take up the lost art of letter writing on real paper to real loved ones in real time. Blogs are a good place to hone our craft and practice civility, but there is no place like paper for "lasting words" to people who need to hear them.

.

I do have one more letter to share (written about 100 years after these). It's from someone famous whom you all know of, but I doubt you've ever read this letter. Rather than add to this already long reading, I'll post it Sunday evening as Part III-C.

.

Until then (or in comments in between), have a great weekend!