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In her own words

A narrow Fellow in the Grass

Emily Dickinson · 1830-1886

A narrow Fellow in the GrassOccasionally rides –You may have met him? did you notHis notice instant is –
The Grass divides as with a Comb –A spotted Shaft is seen,And then it closes at your feetAnd opens further on –
He likes a Boggy Acre –A Floor too cool for Corn –But when a Boy and BarefootI more than once at Noon
Have passed I thought a Whip LashUnbraiding in the SunWhen stooping to secure itIt wrinkled And was gone –
Several of Nature's PeopleI know and they know meI feel for them a transportOf cordiality –
But never met this FellowAttended or AloneWithout a tighter BreathingAnd Zero at the Bone.

See it in her own handHoughton Library, Harvard, page 1 of 4

The poems here are transcribed from Dickinson's own manuscripts, which are in the public domain. Her dashes, capital letters, and spellings are kept as she wrote them, so these read differently from the smoothed versions printed after her death. The manuscript images are reproduced courtesy of the libraries that hold them: the Boston Public Library (no known copyright restrictions), Amherst College Archives and Special Collections (free for non-commercial and educational use, with credit), and the Houghton Library at Harvard University, whose policy permits publishing images of its public-domain holdings. The modern dash-faithful scholarly editions remain under copyright and are not used here.