The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “A narrow fellow in the grass,” ca. 1865.

A narrow Fellow

in the Grass

Occasionally rides -

You may have

met him?

Did you not

His notice instant is -

The Grass divides

as with a Comb -

A spotted Shaft

is seen,

And then it closes

at your Feet

And opens

further on -

He likes a

Boggy Acre -

A Floor too

cool for Corn -

But when a

Boy and Barefoot

I more than

once at Noon

Have passed

I thought a

Whip Lash

Unbraiding in the

Sun

When stooping

to secure it

It wrinkled

And was gone -

Several of

Nature's People

I know and they

know me

I feel for

them a transport

Of Cordiality

But never met

this Fellow

Attended or

alone

Without a

tighter Breathing

And Zero at

the Bone.