thenearsightedmonkey:

Twenty students in The Unthinkable Mind class were told they had a week to memorize Emily Dickinson’s Poem #530.

Two days later, before most of them had started working on it they were asked write down what they could remember of the poem.

QUESTION: What traces does a poem leave behind after one has read it only once or twice?

Poem # 530

You cannot put a Fire out --
A Thing that can ignite
Can go, itself, without a Fan --
Upon the slowest Night --

You cannot fold a Flood --
And put it in a Drawer --
Because the Winds would find it out --
And tell your Cedar Floor --