An Explication of 'The Day Came Slow Till Five O'Clock'

    Figurative language plays a key role in the poem, as well. The best example is  The Morning after Death,  which sounds a lot like  mourning after death.  In fact,  mourning  could even replace  morning  and the poem would still make sense. Another example occurs in the second stanza, when Dickinson uses the words  sweeping  and  putting.   By using such cold, unfeeling words when describing matters of the heart, the author creates a numb, distant tone. She really means that after someone dies, one almost has to detach oneself from the feelings of love that once existed for the deceased.

Death is inevitable; it should not be feared but instead accepted, and this is the main idea and theme explored in Emily Dickinson’s “Because I could not stop for Death.” In the poem, Death is personified as a gentleman who “kindly stopped [stops] for me [her]” (Dickinson 2), “slowly drove [drives] … know[ing] no haste” (Dickinson 5), and with whom she stops at a “house that seemed [seems]/ A swelling of the ground” (Dickinson 17-18) or in other words, her grave. To begin the poem, the fact that Death is represented as “if he were a human being” (Evans 15) implies that it is humane. This contributes to the idea that death is not to fear. Later on, it can be concluded that this person has control over her as she describes how she “had put away / My [her] labor, and my [her] leisure too, / for his civility” (Dickinson 6-8), which implies that “everything that had once seemed so important and distracting now recedes in importance” (Evans 17), and how he “slowly drove [drives] … know[ing] no haste” (Dickinson 5), which gives “no clear sense of the underlying purpose of the journey or its ultimate destination” (Evans 16) and thus implies that only Death knows the path and destination of the journey. Both of these examples contribute to the fact that Death completely controls a person against its will and that it is inevitable. Finally when “we [they] paused before a house that seemed / A swelling of the ground” (Dickinson

“Afraid! Of whom am I afraid? Not Death – for who is He?” (F345). Dickinson, on the other hand, was not shaken by the thought of death, but rather welcomed it. Dickinson’s poetry not only portrayed death as nothing to fear, but it also counterbalanced society’s disdain for death. In one of Dickinson’s most popular poems, she writes “Because I could not stop for death- he kindly stopped for me” (F479). Culture typically sees death as an unwelcome end that everyone must face, but her poetry depicts death as being kind enough to halt its progress to accommodate her. Why is Emily Dickinson’s poetry so in love with death? Death is the only reliable constant (Ottlinger, 42). “All but Death, Can be adjusted Dynasties repaired – Systems – settled in the Sockets – Citadels – dissolved – Wastes of Lives – resown with Colors By Succeeding Springs – Death – unto itself – Exception – is exempt from Change -” (F789). Perhaps the harshest aspect of her poetry’s death is that after it has taken another soul, life moves on simply

She continues in the second stanza with, “We slowly drove – He knew no haste and I had put away my labor and my leisure too” (Dickinson 807). Dickson explains how death did not rush her, she simply stopped living

Death was very prevalent in the life of Emily Dickinson. It had all started with the death of her loved ones and family friends that led her into a state of solitary where she had become very reclusive and gave her time to write the large amount of poems she created. It has provided people who have had something tragic or just in that state of mind to provide an outing as well as provide incredible imagery to pass onto a reader. Emily Dickinson was a poet that has very impressive way of using multiple themes in her poems that create incredible imagery. Each composition that Dickinson has created has impressive utilization of themes like nature, love, and death to create a more picturesque poem. Each poem had it own theme that came from past

Emily Dickinson lived a large period of her life isolated from the outside world, surrounded by her close family and friends. It is apparent that with most of her spare time, she wrote poems and letters. Dickinson’s poems were heavily influenced by the gothic movement in the 19th century of America, and her fascination with nature that is exposed through her continuous theme of nature being the source of joy or pain in your life. Both Dickinson’s curiosity about nature, and the gothic movement, influenced the recurring theme in her poems, which is displayed in the analysis of “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”.

In Dickinson’s poem, “Because I could not stop for Death,” there is much impression in the tone, in symbols, and in the use of imagery that exudes creativity. One might undoubtedly agree to an eerie, haunting, if not frightening, tone in Dickinson’s poem. Dickinson uses controlling adjectives—“slowly” and “passed”—to create a tone that seems rather placid. For example, “We slowly drove—He knew no haste / …We passed the School … / We passed the Setting Sun—,” sets a slow, quiet, calm, and dreamy atmosphere (5, 9, 11,

Death is usually visualized as a frightening character, for example the grim reaper is used in many novels or films. The word ”Death” (line 1) is associated more than someone passing away since Dickinson gave death human characteristics. Its shown when “Death” (1) “Kindly stopped” (2) for the speaker instead of rushing the speaker to enter the afterlife. For the reason that “Death” (1) “Drove slowly…. No haste” (5) meaning that he was patient making it seem like it is a peaceful journey to eternity. Also, as the speaker is with “Death” in the carriage she mentions that he has “Civility” (8) which means that someone is formal polite in behavior toward

The subject of death, including her own was a very prevalent theme in Emily Dickinson’s poems and letters. Some may find her preoccupation with death morbid, but this was not unusual for her time period. The mindset during Ms. Dickinson’s time was that of being prepared to die, in the 19th century people died of illness and accidents at an alarming rate, not to mention the Civil War had a high number of casualties, she also lived 15 years of her youth next to a cemetery. Dickinson’s view on death was never one of something to be feared she almost romanized death, in her poem “Because I Could not Stop for Death”, she actually personifies death while narrating from beyond the grave. In the first stanza she states “I could not stop for

Michael Salvucci Mrs. Comeau English 10 Honors Death, Pain, and the Pursuit of Peace Although Emily Dickinson’s poetry is profoundly insightful, her poems have a very confinedpan of subjects and themes. Most likely due to her early life and social reclusion, Dickinson’s poetry is limited to three major subjects: death, pain, and on a somewhat lighter note, nature. Dickinson’s poetry is greatly influenced by her early life as she led an extremely secluded and pessimisticlife. In her early adult years the poet spent one year studying at female seminary, from 1847 to 1848. Dickinson’s blunt pessimistic attitude is shown in a letter, written to a friend, as she says “I am not happy…Christ is calling everyone here, all my companions have

Emily Dickinson is perhaps one of the most intriguing American poets studied. The remote look in her eyes mirror her life, which she mostly spent secluded in her home in Amherst, Massachusetts. While leading an outwardly reclusive life, she unleashes the faculties of her mind in her powerful poetry. She addresses compelling themes such as death, depression, human despair, individual capability, and the art of poetry. Her feelings on these subjects emerge in her poems, but her exact thoughts are difficult to uncover since her poetry is so highly enigmatic. Likewise, the subject matter of Christianity in her poetry remains one of the most inconsistent of Dickinson’s recurring themes. Emily Dickinson posses an uncanny ability to wrestle down the perfect diction, thus creating worlds of hope, despair, faith, and endless questioning.Through her use of imagery, Dickinson displays her linguistic prowess and the intricacies of language.

In Emily Dickinson’s poem, in line 1, 2 "Because I couldn’t stop for death –He kindly stopped for me" the word “death” delivers a positive mood as the speaker seems respect and awe death. Moreover, death is portrayed as a phenomenon that is beyond ‎human’s control. Death has its own control; it is something that human cannot decide themselves but only death can do stop for human, invite them into its carriage, not vice versa. In ‎addition, the word “kindly” in the line presents calmness to the readers as death is not something that human should scare off. Besides, the word "slowly" and the phrase "no haste" in

Emily Dickinson once said, “Dying is a wild night and a new road.” Some people welcome death with open arms while others cower in fear when confronted in the arms of death. Through the use of ambiguity, metaphors, personification and paradoxes Emily Dickinson still gives readers a sense of vagueness on how she feels about dying. Emily Dickinson inventively expresses the nature of death in the poems, “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain (280)”, “I Heard a fly Buzz—When I Died—(465)“ and “Because I could not stop for Death—(712)”.

We are immediately made aware at the beginning of the poem that there is nothing out of place about this day except that they lost a family member. Dickinson was letting it be known that while the rest of the world continued as usual, they sat there in a room watching one of their suffering family members take her last breath. Death makes life different somehow. As Dickinson states, “-this to Us Made Nature Different” (lines 3,4), she tells us that when her family member died it changed them. This poem shows the raw emotion of sadness and the effect of grief overtaken her in just 6 short stanzas.

Emily Dickinson a modern romantic writer, whose poems considered imaginative and natural, but also dark as she uses death as the main theme many times in her writings. She made the death look natural and painless since she wanted the reader to look for what after death and not be stuck in that single moment. In her poems imagination play a big role as it sets the ground for everything to unfold in a magical way. The speakers in Dickinson’s poetry, are sharp-sighted observers who see the inescapable limitations of their societies as well as their imagined and imaginable escapes. To make the abstract tangible, to define meaning without confining it, to inhabit a house that never became a prison, Dickinson created in her writing a distinctively elliptical language for expressing what was possible but not yet realized. She turned increasingly to this style that came to define her writing. The poems are rich in aphorism and dense