Waiter, a fly is buzzing in my California roll

In one of Peter Balakian's more profound or frightening (or profoundly frightening) moments, he claimed that if Emily Dickinson were alive today, she would be into sushi. Take that as you will. At least we know she wouldn't have heaped her plate with fame:

Fame is a fickle food (1659)

Fame is a fickle food
Upon a shifting plate
Whose table once a
Guest but not
The second time is set.

Whose crumbs the crows inspect
And with ironic caw
Flap past it to the Farmer's Corn -
Men eat of it and die.


And what would you like to drink with your sushi, Ms. Dickinson?

I taste a liquor never brewed (214)

I taste a liquor never brewed -
From Tankards scooped in Pearl -
Not all the Frankfort Berries
Yield such an Alcohol!

Inebriate of air - am I -
And Debauchee of Dew -
Reeling - thro' endless summer days -
From inns of molten Blue -

When "Landlords" turn the drunken Bee
Out of the Foxglove's door -
When Butterflies - renounce their "drams" -
I shall but drink the more!

Till Seraphs swing their snowy Hats -
And Saints - to the windows run -
To see the Tippler
Leaning against the - Sun!


Feeling a little tipsy now? If you're in the mood for a song, word has it that Emily Dickinson's poems can be set perfectly to the Yellow Rose of Texas, since it shares their ballad meter.