Today’s Poem of the Day — for the First of March — is from Emily Dickinson (1830–1886), and it’s one of her minor poems. Except, of course, that, being Emily Dickinson, she couldn’t just dash off a minor poem. Her talent for letting a conceit unfold was at the level of the 17th-century Metaphysical Poets, and even in a light poem, she’s capable of taking the idea of March arriving like a visitor and letting it run.

In almost a self-parody of her use of punctuation, the 26-line poem has 24 emdashes, with only one comma, one question mark, and no periods. The poem gestures toward her usual hymn or ballad meter, four-foot lines alternating with three-foot lines, and rhymed on the shorter lines.

Yet the longer lines are here sometimes broken into two two-foot lines (“Dear March — Come in — / How glad I am — ”), while the rhymes are often slant or partial (“before” / “you are”). Enjoying the visit of windy March, the poem’s speaker scorns the late knock of April at the door as an unwelcome visitor who had the temerity to stay away a year.

Dear March — Come in —
by Emily Dickinson

Dear March — Come in — 
How glad I am — 
I hoped for you before — 
Put down your Hat — 
You must have walked — 
How out of Breath you are — 
Dear March, how are you, and the Rest — 
Did you leave Nature well — 
Oh March, Come right upstairs with me — 
I have so much to tell — 

I got your Letter, and the Birds — 
The Maples never knew that you were coming — 
I declare — how Red their Faces grew — 
But March, forgive me — 
And all those Hills you left for me to Hue — 
There was no Purple suitable — 
You took it all with you — 

Who knocks? That April — 
Lock the Door — 
I will not be pursued — 
He stayed away a Year to call
When I am occupied — 
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come

That blame is just as dear as Praise
And Praise as mere as Blame —

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With “Poem of the Day,” The New York Sun offers a daily portion of verse selected by Joseph Bottum with the help of the North Carolina poet Sally Thomas, the Sun’s associate poetry editor. Tied to the day, or the season, or just individual taste, the poems will be typically drawn from the lesser-known portion of the history of English verse. In the coming months we will be reaching out to contemporary poets for examples of current, primarily formalist work, to show that poetry can still serve as a delight to the ear, an instruction to the mind, and a tonic for the soul.