Emily Dickinson’s recipe for cocoanut cake, via Tori Avey at the The History Kitchen. Avey’s post is great—she guides the reader through making the cake, includes photos of the process, and even pairs the recipe with an appropriate poem. And of course, she transcribes Dickinson’s scratchy notes:
Emily Dickinson’s Cocoanut Cake
1 cup cocoanut
2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoonful soda
1 teaspoonful cream of tartarThis makes one half the rule–
From Gordon Lish’s story “How to Write a Poem.”
My life closed twice before its close—
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to meSo huge, so hopeless to conceive
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.
—Emily Dickinson.
“One need not be a Chamber — to be Haunted –” by Emily Dickinson:
One need not be a Chamber — to be Haunted —
One need not be a House —
The Brain has Corridors — surpassing
Material Place —Far safer, of a Midnight Meeting
External Ghost
Than its interior Confronting —
That Cooler Host.Far safer, through an Abbey gallop,
The Stones a’chase —
Than Unarmed, one’s a’self encounter —
In lonesome Place —Ourself behind ourself, concealed —
Should startle most —
Assassin hid in our Apartment
Be Horror’s least.The Body — borrows a Revolver —
He bolts the Door —
O’erlooking a superior spectre —
Or More —
“I reason, Earth is short–” by Emily Dickinson:
I reason, Earth is short —
And Anguish — absolute —
And many hurt,
But, what of that?I reason, we could die —
The best Vitality
Cannot excel Decay,
But, what of that?I reason, that in Heaven —
Somehow, it will be even —
Some new Equation, given —
But, what of that?
–from William H. Gass’s essay “Finding a Form.”
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