Emily Elizabeth Dickinson poetry
...riting and receiving letters, her only contact with the outside world, proved to be important to her through this poem. For example, the poem addresses “Sweet-countrymen,” when she wants to be loved (Ferlazzo 125). This shows her need for communication even though she chose isolation. Emily learned that poetry gave her control and glory while still giving her the freedom she needed. It gave her companionship and strength that she used to protect herself from the difficulties of being alone (Knapp 183). The last stanza of the poem proves this through her “Hands I cannot see” (Selected Poems by Emily Dickinson) 19). It displays the lack of relationship, yet her longing for it. “This Is My Letter to the World” also effectively reveals her despair from her possible lover’s departure. The line “That never wrote to me,” Emily expresses her grief of a former love not returning her letters. In her book, Her Letter to the World, Polly Longsworth introduces the insightful book with Emily’s poem, “This Is My Letter to the World,” to create a bond with teens who feel overlooked or isolated, similar to Emily Dickinson herself (2). Emily Dickinson conveys her despair and isolation through “This Is My Letter to the World.” Emily Dickinson shows her contrasting views of death due to her parents’ deaths, and portrays her religious views in her poems “Because I Could Not Stop for Death,” and “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain” (Hollander 288, 236). “Because I Could Not Stop for Death,” is a passage about the journey from one world to the next. This poem shows that death can be courteous (www.cswnet.com/~erin/ed15.htm). The beginning of the poem is very casual and light-hearted using words such as “kindly,” and is also ironic using the word, “immortality.” The poem reveals a lady who is too content with her life that she does not respond to a gentleman’s call; however, she eventually is compelled by his generosity to go with him (Ferlazzo 55). The suitor is symbolic of God, leading the way to her ultimate end (Knapp 92). They drive slowly through the park leisurely, as if they had as much time as they wished. This ironic word usage sets the mood for the rest of the poem. Her new infatuation with his man grows as Dickinson uses transitional words to show passage of their life such as “setting,” alluding to the sun. By the fourth stanza, she is catching a chill which shows her inevitable death growing near. She is covered in lace, a garment that would often be found on a dead woman’s body. As the carriage ride ends, the gentleman has gone. She realizes she had been “tricked, seduced, and then abandoned.” However, her death was unavoidable and she accepts it gracefully (Ferlazzo 56). This poem is reflective upon the gentle death of her father. “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain,” depicts a slow and tragic death, which is nothing less than terrifying. Believed to be an outside perspective of a New England funeral, the poem slowly moves from anguish, to slowly losing sanity, to building pressure and tension, and finally, isolation (Ferlazzo 90). Her original anguish could have been caused by the painful death of her parents. Although she had a distanced relationship with her mother, the torment of her tragic death is still a factor. The auditory aspect of this poem is the focal point (Knapp 88). The setting of the funeral further dramatizes her despair. As she loses her sanity, the pressure and tension were also growing. A beating drum helped set a mood for this growing tension, driving her slowly insane until it threatens to paralyze her mind. After the coffin is placed, the death bell from the church is rung, its sound acute to her, indicating her still growing insanity. Finally, there is silence. This silence marks her isolation. The “plank of reason” broke and she “fell down.” She is completely irrational at this point and will never recover (Ferlazzo 92). This poem is reflective upon the quick and brutal death of her mother. Clearly, Dickinson was influenced by the death of her parents and her religious beliefs in her poetry. Dickinson’s brilliant poem, “There’s a Certain Slant of Light,” reflects her religious view, her semi-transcendental position, and her outlook on death. The poem revolves mainly around her loss of faith over the years. The poem is transcending from innocent childhood, to a young girl looking for the answer to life, to a mature adult who is sure of herself. During this transition, Dickinson was realizing the true depth of her misery (Knapp 130-131). The setting of the poem is during the winter, symbolizing death and imminent end. The light of winter is an ironic statement because instead of illuminating the soul, the light threatens the soul’s existence. The darkening reflects on her inner darkness upon the subject of faith. God, often being associated with a light, is missing from Dickinson. Dickinson uses words such as oppressing, heft, hurt, scar, despair, affliction, and look of Death to create a mood of darkness and death. She also uses contradictory words such as “heavenly hurt” and “imperial affliction,” a word displaying majesty with a word showing pain, to show the inconsistencies of her beliefs (Ferlazzo 116). The lines “Heavenly Hurt, it gives us / We can find no scar” shows the subtle inner changes through the lack of a scar or wound (Knapp 132). The random capitalization in this poem is used to place emphasis on certain words (www.guweb2.gonzaga.edu/). Dickinson personifies nature in the last stanza to show the superiority of nature. Her semi-transcendental view that a mystical bond exists between man and nature and that nature can show mankind its flaws is present through this poem. The “Landscape listens” and “Shadows hold their breath” as if waiting for something enormous (Ferlazzo 116). Emily Dickinson clearly shows her religious and semi-transcendentalist views along with her outlook on death in her poem, “There’s a Certain Slant of Light.” Because of her isolation and childhood, helping her ability to observe, Emily Dickinson displays her fear of nature in her poem, “I Started Early - Took My Dog,” and her admiration for nature in her poem, “A bird came down the Walk.” “I started Early - Took My Dog” leads insight to the childhood and possible sexual rape of Emily Dickinson through the use of nature. The first two stanzas talk about a child who visited the Sea and took her dog, the dog representing companionship and loyalty. The mermaids, a symbol of childhood pleasure, come out from the below. The frigate is symbolic of a feeling making its way through unconsciousness and unknown areas. A frigate is a defense ship reflecting on her desire for defense. The upper floor of the frigate symbolizes the mind and intelligence. The “Hempen Hands” invite the young child to enter the frigate; however, this act exposes her to danger of drowning physically or psychologically. Dickinson represents herself as a “Mouse,” the way others view her, because of her seeming insignificance because of isolation. From the third stanza on, a mood of terror is created, possibly indicating the rape of the young girl, or perhaps Emily Dickinson herself. “The Tide” is a destructive force that dictates the moon in this poem, an example of nature controlling everything around it, even nature itself. Ironically, the tide, a masculine force, is controlling the moon, a feminine force as opposed to the usual sense of the moon directing the tide. This also may signify the possibility of a rape. The tide seems to come after her and it went past her “simple shoe,” past her apron, her belt, and her bodice, as well. These allusions to the body are welcomed at first by the narrator, comparing it to morning dew. However, the terror overcomes the narrator in the fifth verse. The tide is given a gender, “he,” and she is running away from “His silver heel.” The Pearl mentioned in the fifth stanza stands for spiritual values, and the loss of this pearl is synonymous with a spiritual loss of soul and identity, further indicating a rape. Once she reach...