Emily Dickinson Lexicon

bun, n. [OE.]

Muffin; small cake; sweet roll; piece of bread; gift of pastry.

bundle (-s), n. [prob. Germanic; see bind, v.]

1. Packet; roll; package; small wrapped parcel; [fig.] item; thing; mass; object; affair; matter.
2. Load; burden; weight; cargo; freight; encumbrance; [metaphor] cross; trial; tribulation; [fig.] life; carcass; mortal body.
3. Pack; knapsack; things; collection of stuff; belongings fastened together for carrying; [metaphor] concern; worry; [fig.] being; character; identity; person; self; spirit; soul; existence; (see 1 Samuel 25:29).

bung, n.

Plug; cork; stopper; closing for the mouth of a cask; [fig.] phellem; coagulation; clotting agent; protective tissue; hemorrhage prevention.

Bunker Hill, proper n. [Bunker < OFr bon quer, good heart; see also hill, n.]

Mound in Charleston, Massachusetts; knoll named for early American settler George Bunker; location of bloodiest Revolutionary War battle, actually Breed's Hill; place where many soldiers died (see ED letters); [fig.] cemetery; graveyard; resting place.

buoyant, adj. [Sp. or OFr.]

Rising; brimming; overflowing; lightweight; springing up; [fig.] vital; animating; sustaining; life-giving; bearing up.

bur (burr, burs), n. [Danish 'burdock'.] (webplay: seeds, sweetbread).

1. Seed pod; chestnut husk.
2. Pine cone; deciduous spike; female catkin of an evergreen.
3. Sticker; thorn; goat-head; prickly weed; rough husk; dry flower head; [onomatapoetic word play with “burrrr”] shiver; shudder; trembling; tremor; chill.
4. Stubble; chaff; straw; remains of the harvest.
5. Pod; shell; cod; case; capsule; [fig.] head; skull.

burden, n. [OE] (webplay: borne).

1. Load; weight; labor; work; difficulty; encumbrance; toil of carrying something heavy; [fig.] duty; responsibility; (see Matthew 11:30).
2. Effort; exertion; trouble; inconvenience; [fig.] refrain; chorus; under song; bass part; bird call; musical accompaniment; recurrent verse of a song.
3. Travail; sorrow; cross; [fig.] guilt; sin; grief; sorrow; (see Galatians 6:2).

burdock (-'s), n. [bur + OE docca; see OED bur, n. and dock, n.]

Bur; sticky; prickly seed pod; dry flower head; bothersome weed; plant from the genus Arctium.

burglar, n. [AFr; NW says burgh, or burg, a house.]

Robber; nocturnal housebreaker; one guilty of breaking into a home to steal; [fig.] killer; body-snatcher; personification of death.

Burgoyne, proper n. [Fr. < Gothic baurgs, burgh, borough, barriers.]

John Burgoyne (1722-1792); British general in the American Revolution; English leader who surrendered to American forces at Saratoga in 1777; [fig.] bloodshed; laborious struggle; difficult fight that ends in defeat; [fig.] sundown; red sky at dusk.