Emily Dickinson wrote more than 1,700 poems, most of which were not published until after her death. The majority of the poems chosen for this collection were written for Dickinson's niece and nephews, who lived in the house next to hers in Amherst, Massachusetts. Rarely leaving the confines of her house and yard, Dickinson passed these small messages across the lawn to her sister-in-law to share with her children.

Thomas B. Allen was born on January 28, 1928, in Nashville. Mr. Allen attended Vanderbilt University on a football scholarship but left for the Art Institute. Upon graduating, he joined the Marines, although before reporting for duty he visited New York to seek out editorial illustration assignments. The first came from Esquire's art director, Henry Wolf, who after Mr. Allen's discharge commissioned him to do full-page color paintings and more intricate visual essays. Soon Mr. Allen was getting a string of editorial jobs from Seventeen, Colliers, McCall's and Sports Illustrated, as well as advertising work from NBC. His passion for the environment and Americana led to illustrating and writing more than a dozen children's books, including Good-bye, Charles Lindbergh: Based on a True Story by Louise Borden, and In Coal Country, by Judith Hendershot. This spring he completed the illustrations for Grandma's General Store: The Ark by Dorothy Carter, to be published in 2005. Mr. Allen divided his career between doing illustration and teaching it. In 1983 he was named Hallmark Professor at the University of Kansas, and he was later chair of the illustration department at the Ringling School of Art and Design in Sarasota, where he taught until his death on November 8, 2004 at his home in Sarasota, Florida.

Ferris Cook is an artist and book illustrator who lives in upstate New York. Since 1990, she has illustrated and edited many books with collections of poetry and essays including: Odes to Common Things (Pablo Neruda), Odes to Opposites (Pablo Neruda), The Sonnets of Shakespeare, A Murmur in the Trees (Emily Dickinson), The Rose Window (Rilke), Bark (a collection of poetry about dogs), Yowl (a collection of poetry about cats), Garden Dreams and Remembered Gardens (both collections of essays on gardening), Gifts of Love (a collection of love poems), as well as The Garden Trellis, which she wrote and illustrated. Her latest work is an illustrated Arabic edition of Pablo Neruda's 100 Love Sonnets.