#MastersofSocialIsolation. 1. Emily Dickinson, who withdrew to her home in Amherst and adopted the life of a recluse or “stationary pilgrim.” She maintained a lively correspondence but had little personal contact beyond her family, saving her energies for observation and poetry.

“Some keep the sabbath going to Church—/ I keep it, staying at home—/ With a Bobolink for a Chorister—/ And an Orchard for a Dome./...God preached, a noted Clergyman—/ and the Sermon is never long./ so instead of getting to Heaven, at last—/ I’m going, all along.”

Her observations of bees, birds, flowers showed a capacity to see the universe in a grain of sand. Such details of natural order were a harbor opening to musings on eternity—for which death was ultimately the gateway. “Because I could not stop for Death—He kindly stopped for me.”

“Each life converges to some center/ Expressed or still—/ Exists in every human nature/ A goal—/... Ungained, it may be, by life’s low venture, / But then—/ Eternity enables the endeavoring / Again.” Before dying on 5/14/1886 she wrote: “Little Cousins,—Called back. Emily.”