Emily Dickinson Review and Interpretation of Poems #449,...

Emily Dickinson Emily Dickinsons poetry mostly reflects her feelings towards death and the projected events after death. As a poet, she was a very inward, and wrote about feelings that came from deeply within her--unlike other poets of her time whose societies were directly shown in their poetry (i.e.-Walt Whitman). Of course social and historical values shaped her personality, but in her poetry alone little can be derived about either the time period she lived in or the political and societal issues during her lifetime. Emily Dickinson was a very unique poet for her time. Her poems were mostly written in four line stanzas that have the voice of a hymn or psalm. Her scheme was usually an ABCB rhyme scheme. Her poems have short pauses†¦show more content†¦I willed my keepsakes, signed away What portion of me Could make assignable, - and then There interposed a fly, With blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz, Between the light and me; And then the windows failed, and then I could not see to see. -Emily Dickinson poem #465 In the first stanza the speaker hears a fly buzz while she lay on her deathbed. This fly may seem to be irrelevant in a time of death, because as the last line suggests, she does die (I could not see to see). But this weird distraction becomes the figure of death itself as the flys presence cuts the speakers sight off from the light of the window and his deathblow is the (blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz). This deathbed scene also describes the signing of a will at the last moment -(what portion of me be assignable). Her will is a symbolization of all of her materialistic accomplishments and what her life has amounted to. This is a time when family members are false and she is crying (the eyes beside had wrung them dry). This deathbed scene is an endless image, which will happen time and time again--in the sense that usually if you are on the verge of death or are very ill you will be surrounded by family members, some of which you probably havent seen for awhile and will take advanta ge of this as a last chance to make amends with you (or to get more out of your will). The last poem also