Emily Dickinson Funeral

Since her view of death differ in these two poems, the literary devices she uses in each poem have a different affect. Dickinson’s use of metaphors in “Because I could not stop for death,” illustrates images of death, and the journey of death for oneself. The reader can picture death as a person driving a carriage, and in our minds, they can see a carriage riding down the road passing a school. In reality, they know what these images mean figuratively. Her paradoxes of heaven and hell in “My life closed twice before its close, “gives the reader a vivid image of the two after lives, even though everyone has a different perspective on them. In this poem, she uses these paradoxes to describe that her loved ones are happy in heaven, but without them, she is in

The narrator believes you do not have to attend church to be spiritual and that common practice can be done in a peaceful place such as the orchard in her yard. The last two lines of the poem state, “So instead of getting to Heaven, at last- / I’m going, all along” (Dickinson 639). I interpreted this as the long journey to heaven has become a huge part of her life. It is not just a look into the future, but a continuous look in the present. The symbols Dickinson uses in this poem are by far the highlight of this short piece of poetry. In the first stanza, a bobolink and orchard are used to replace things that modern churches value as sacred and holy. Those natural occurrences are used by Dickinson to show her love for nature. More examples of this are shown in the second stanza. The narrator uses her own “sexton” to call her holly time instead of a brass bell to call church service. This is important to analyze as yet another natural occurrence that highly defines the authors writing style.

Emily Dickinson is one of the most important American poets of the 1800s. Dickinson, who was known to be quite the recluse, lived and died in the town of Amherst, Massachusetts, spending the majority of her days alone in her room writing poetry. What few friends she did have would testify that Dickinson was a rather introverted and melancholy person, which shows in a number of her poems where regular themes include death and mortality. One such poem that exemplifies her “dark side” is, “Because I Could Not Stop for Death”. In this piece, Dickinson tells the story of a soul’s transition into the afterlife showing that time and death have outright power over our lives and can make what was once significant become meaningless.

This strongly contrasts the despair of “I felt a funeral in my brain” and “Griefs”, because it looks at death in a more positive light. However, it does maintain some of Dickinson’s death imagery that is seen in much of her other work; “We paused before a house that seemed A swelling of the ground; The roof was scarcely visible, The cornice but a mound” (The Chariot). This “swelling of the ground” is in fact a grave. She still maintains her dark theme of death and continually references it. Through the last lines, she establishes that death is a continual process through time; “I first surmised the horses’ heads Were toward eternity”(The

“The straightforward mention of ‘reason’ suffering some kind of misfortune makes it hard not to conclude that Dickinson is specifically referring to some kind of madness. She is not using a metaphor of a storm in this poem. She is openly declaring that she felt as if something in her brain has died” (Hart, Par. 9). While Dickinson tends to use metaphors in most of her poems to describe her emotions, the only metaphorical reference in this poem is the actual funeral itself. The funeral is simply a representation of the feelings of depression taking over her brain. More symbolism can be interpreted in this poem when considering the confined life that Dickinson lived. She spent much of her time in her room, isolating herself from the world and writing poetry. As the casket is part of a funeral service, it can be interpreted that it is a resemblance of her mind and body being trapped inside a restricted place, where she cannot escape. From an article written by Eleanor Wilner, she describes how Dickinson’s secluded life contributed to her pains in life and desire to write poetry. “The struggle involved in such a total project of suppression is reflected in many of her poems, like the often quoted ‘I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,’ which suggest a mind threatened with dissolution, turning it on itself, walling itself up as she did in her father’s house, using

Emily Dickinson’s “Because I could not stop for Death” is a remarkable masterpiece that exercises thought between the known and the unknown. Critics call Emily Dickinson’s poem a masterpiece with strange “haunting power.”

This is symbolic of her looking at death as a new beginning as opposed to a sad ending. There is a feeling of disappointment as she thinks that she is going towards eternity but she just ends up viewing the “House that Seemed a Swelling of the Ground” and then centuries later, reflects upon her journey towards and eternity she didn’t witness. To Dickinson death was not something to be afraid of but to rather embrace and accept because it was inevitable, yet as in her life ends up disappointed because death leads to nothingness.

In addition to poetic devices used, the poem has a structural pattern that deepens the meaning by adding emphasis. The poem structurally consists of six stanzas with four lines each. These stanzas use an 8,6,8,6 syllable scheme for most of the poem. In addition, each line is written in iambic meter meaning every second syllable is stressed. This is also a common syllable scheme for ballads and hymns. Knowing Dickinson’s background, this syllable scheme adds meaning as a ballad is used to narrate something and a hymn is a religious song or poem. In the poem, there are unsystematic capital letters and dashes in multiple locations. However, these capital letters have meaning behind them. In lines one and four “Because I could not stop for Death/And

In the poem "I Felt a Funeral in My Brain" Emily Dickinson exposes a person's intense anguish and suffering as they sink into a state of extreme madness. The poem is a carefully constructed analysis of the speaker's own mental experience. Dickinson uses the image of a funeral-service to symbolize the death of the speaker's sanity. The poem is terrifying for the reader as it depicts a realization of the collapse of one's mental stability, which is horrifying for most. The reader experiences the horror of the speaker's descending madness as the speaker's mind disintegrates and loses its grasp on reality. "I Felt a Funeral in My Brain,"

Much like “So proud was she to die” I believe Dickinson here within the first lines of the poem is emphasizing with suicidal people, whether because of her obsession with death, or the fact she was suicidal herself. Within the last four lines however the paradox within the poem is introduced that even though death can save you from the “abhorred abode”, most people aren’t in a rush to get there. “however good to see, is shunned, we must admit, like an adversity.” Dickinson uses that simile to drive home the point that death for some is a large obstacle.

      The flow of the poem becomes faster as the woman gets closer and closer to her final destination, where the tone of the poem becomes more sorrowful, but then in the last four lines she gives the reader a glimpse of hope. In these verses the poem seems to slow down as Dickinson writes, “Since the-tis-Centuries-and yet/ Feels shorter than the day/ I were first surmised the Horses’ Heads/ Were toward eternity.” The reader is given a feeling that life has ended and that she is going peacefully through eternity.

The soul is transferring from one life to another. Possibly inferring there is not a universal acceptance at the gates of heaven. The spirituality of Dickinson is not fully known, but the parallel of the “Stumbling Buzz” is a strong connection to the uncertainty of death finally approaching the person. Another instance that highlights this point is, “I heard a Fly buzz - when I died” (Dickinson). This is directly appointed towards death, but within the line, there is plenty of insight to delve into.

The poem “Because I could not stop for Death (479)” by Emily Dickinson describes author’s concept of the last seconds of a life as well as her concept of the death. The poem follows a comparatively simple “ABCB” rhyme scheme, which indicates that the poetess’s goal is not to exercise her writing skills, but to reflect her opinion. By this poem Emily Dickinson presents a new way of thinking about the death. The speaker of the poem, assumingly a female, does not expect her own death - her life is so active and busy that she does not have time to think about dying. However, the death is inevitable, thus when the time comes, her Death arrives. The death is personified as a man that takes the speaker for a ride across her life. As the speaker enters

The poem begins with a “Funeral” (1) and “Mourners” (2) in the speaker’s brain. The funeral is an extended metaphor that Dickinson utilizes throughout the first three stanzas. The word, “funeral,” possesses a connotation of an arranged and organized ceremony. However, Dickinson uses the funeral to represent the deterioration of the speaker’s mind. Sharon Leiter, a scholarly critic, writes that “the funeral is an external image of her inner world; it never stands outside the speaker” (“Critical Companion of Emily Dickinson”).

In the poem “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,” Emily Dickinson uses symbolism to convey some sort of mental funeral that the speaker is experiencing. The funeral image that Dickinson depicts in the first line of the poem: “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,” does not literally represent a funeral, but it is used to symbolism a mental breakdown and agony that the speaker is going through. By using this symbolism, the speaker is imagining the death of old ways of thought. Dickinson writes that when the funeral service was “like a Drum—“ (Dickinson 43) and that it “Kept beating—beating—till I thought My Mind was going numb—“ (43), leaving readers believing that the speaker is going mad. By depicting this image, Dickinson reveals that with the death of old thought; there is some sort of numbness or pain that is necessary to “progress to a better state” (Goldfarb 2). By repeating the beating sound two times, along with the rhyming sequence in the previous lines of the poem, Dickinson is stressing the numbness and the importance of it.