I Measure Every Grief I Meet

I measure every grief I meet
With analytic eyes;
I wonder if it weighs like mine,
Or has an easier size.


I wonder if they bore it long,
Or did it just begin?
I could not tell the date of mine,
It feels so old a pain.


I wonder if it hurts to live,
And if they have to try,
And whether, could they choose between,
They would not rather die.


I wonder if when years have piled--
Some thousands--on the cause
Of early hurt, if such a lapse
Could give them any pause;


Or would they go on aching still
Through centuries above,
Enlightened to a larger pain
By contrast with the love.


The grieved are many, I am told;
The reason deeper lies,--
Death is but one and comes but once
And only nails the eyes.


There's grief of want, and grief of cold,--
A sort they call 'despair,'
There's banishment from native eyes,
In sight of native air.


And though I may not guess the kind
Correctly yet to me
A piercing comfort it affords
In passing Calvary,


To note the fashions of the cross
Of those that stand alone
Still fascinated to presume
That some are like my own.

-Emily Dickinson "I Measure Every Grief I Meet"