Poem by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

The Bat

THE bat is dun with wrinkled wings
Like fallow article,
And not a song pervades his lips,
Or none perceptible.

His small umbrella, quaintly halved,
Describing in the air
An arc alike inscrutable,—
Elate philosopher!

Deputed from what firmament
Of what astute abode,
Empowered with what malevolence
Auspiciously withheld.

To his adroit Creator
Ascribe no less the praise;
Beneficent, believe me,
His eccentricities.

1. High from the Earth I Heard a Bird
2. To March
3. Dawn (Not knowing when the dawn will come)
4. March
5. A Murmur in the Trees to Note

Theodore Roethke The Bat ("By day the bat is cousin to the mouse")

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