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Emily Dickinson's Because I Could Not Stop For Death

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Many people have a true fear of death. Many are scared of pain associated with dying. Many fear where they will go after their passing. Death is inevitable and is the finish line that we all must cross at the end of our journey of life. Emily Dickinson was not afraid of the preconceived idea of death. In her poems, she presented the idea of death with much ease and comfort. She saw death as a stepping stone to the afterlife, not the end. In her famous poem “Because I Could Not Stop For Death,” Dickinson's use of peaceful imagery, comforting metaphors, and personification to describe immortality proves that death should not be feared and that it is a natural part of human life. The Imagery used in “Because I Could Not Stop For Death” welcomes …show more content…

“When Death and the speaker arrive at the newly dug grave, it welcomes them like a house, the swollen earth resembling a roof, the headstone like a cornice. The speaker who died for beauty quickly finds companionship in the grave- also characterized as a house, with rooms in which corpses are laid like guests assigned to bedrooms” (Barnsley 2). Here we see the clear metaphor of the house of death. The tone is welcoming rather than fearful and dark. It is evident that Dickinson did this on purpose to show that death is not something to turn your back to, it is comforting like a home. “I first surmised the Horses Heads Were toward Eternity-” (Dickinson 1). The metaphor about the horses heads could mean many different things to many different people. The reader does not know what eternity Dickinson believed in, but she did in fact believe that death was not the end. “Such an open end like this allows the listener to broaden their mind and develop their very own ‘theory’ of what actually is happening. While some might think that she is headed towards Heaven, or simply the place for a soul to rest in peace for the rest of their existence. The possibility is infinite. It all depends on one’s belief and definition of what afterlife is” (Ikhsanti 3). To many people, the thought of afterlife after their death gives them a sense of security and peace. Dickinson had peace with this and to her, death was natural and she clearly exemplified this in her

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