The Earth a Letter sent today
And I its Reader sit
To open every Latitude
And find the Weather in it
Each City bears a slip of sky
A Number and a Mood
A Pressure and a cardinal Wind
A brief Beatitude
London keeps a middle Sum
Sixteen and Clouds half-drawn
A Wind of fifteen tugs the Sleeve
Of afternoon half-gone
New York is fevered Thirty-three
The Overcast like Wool
Yet Humidity a thin Nineteen
A dryness in the full
Paris Eighteen and grey above
The Wind a whispered Seven
She wears her Overcast like Silk
Borrowed perhaps from Heaven
Tokyo also Sixteen sits
But heavy Eighty-two
The Humidity a second skin
The Wind too soft to do
Sydney wakes to Nine degrees
A Clear sky winter's hand
A Wind of sixteen bites the brow
Of the Antipodal land
So turns the Globe from cold to hot
From Winter to the Sun
The Reader turns her page – and waits
For Cities yet to come
Cairo stands at Twenty-nine
Dry Thirty humming bright
The Clear sky like an unrolled scroll
Above the desert's white
Mumbai also Twenty-nine
But Drizzle moderate falls
A Humidity of Eighty-five
The monsoon at the walls
Beijing Twenty-two and dim
A Light drizzle almost still
The Wind of two a hesitation
Above the patient hill
Buenos Aires Sixteen soft
Cloud partly like a thought
A Humidity of Ninety hangs
With nothing to be bought
Nairobi Eighteen Overcast
The Equator gone shy
A Wind of seven and the gauze
Of Seventy-nine close by
Mexico City Twenty drips
A Light drizzle without weight
The altitude composes calm
Where I would meditate
Los Angeles Twenty-three
The Clear sky wears its gold
A Wind of ten across the palms
A weather never cold
So spins the Letter read entire
Twelve verses – twelve degrees
The Earth a Stanza Atmosphere
The Reader on her knees
What Postage could pay this freight?
What Hand could hold the page?
The Sky is signature enough
And every Cloud – its sage
Emily Dickinson reads the weather, Friday June 5, 2026.
