Lonely
Emily Dickinson’s “I’m nobody! Who are you?”, and what it means
For when you feel like the only one.
I’m nobody! Who are you? Are you nobody, too? Then there’s a pair of us — don’t tell! They’d banish us, you know.
In plain words
A small, funny poem about finding one other person who feels unseen too. The joke is in the arithmetic: the moment there are two of you, “nobody” becomes a club, with secrets and everything. Loneliness tends to say you’re the only one. The poem suggests one other person is enough to change the count.
Sit with this line → A few quiet exchanges about what it stirs in you.
Worth knowing
Published after her death, in 1891. Her editors smoothed her punctuation, so the dashes and capitals in her own handwritten version differ. Only the first stanza is shown here.
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