“I want to tell them of what the flowers talk about when the garden is very still.”

A characteristic expression of Marston's imaginative intimacy with the natural world · Letter, quoted in an 1887 reminiscence

• Imagination
• Nature
• Wonder

“And as they are of no school they will be fresh, as the old delights of earth are ever fresh.”

Arguing that poetry independent of schools and fashions can retain its freshness · Letter to Louise Chandler Moulton, quoted in Representative Women of New England

• Independence
• Poetry
• Tradition

“If I only could sleep!”

A stark recurring expression of exhaustion during the final illness of his life · Late letters quoted by Louise Chandler Moulton in her biographical sketch

• Rest
• Sadness
• Suffering