Born and raised in Massachusetts, Emily Dickinson grew up in a wealthy Puritan family. Although his parents had three children, they were not involved with them. Dickinson noted that her father was "too busy with his knickers" and wrote to a friend "I never had a mother." With access to a high-quality education and his preference for isolation, he became interested in creating literary works. Before his death, he spent several decades writing poetry in his family home. Unfortunately, his "hard-to-read handwriting" caused publishers to shy away from his literary works, so they published only seven poems during his lifetime. After his death in 1886, his sister Lavinia found nearly 900 of Dickinson's unpublished poems. Most of them are unnamed and undated. In 1955 Thomas H. Johnson published a three-volume edition of his poems. In these, he referred to each unnamed poem as a number. Today his works are usually cited by number in Johnson's addition or the first line of the poem. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original EssayThe themes of his hundreds of poems were usually topics such as change, death, God, love, nature, secrets, or truth. In the many poems that make the reader feel subtle changes in emotions, the choice of words and images places “emphasis on the ritual of death with a movement from meaning to death.” In some of his poems the rhyme scheme is irregular and then becomes regulated. This could represent a loss of control or, if it were the opposite, a taking of control. Repetition and other literary devices emphasize his belief that time will continue after humanity. A great example of this is a repetition in “Because I Could Not Stop for Death. In the poem I heard a funeral, in my brain, one of the first qualities of the poem that a reader would notice is the use of a multitude of hyphens.” They represent the idea that words and statements come quickly and then leave. Although Dickinson preferred to isolate herself alone in her room, historians believe she did not have many, if any, relationships. In fact, neither she nor her sister married. Although Dickinson was presumed to be mentally unstable, he still had a high degree of poetic ability. Richard B. Sewall observed: “Here she seems closer to bottoming than ever before. But there was nothing wrong in his mind when he wrote [this] poem.” Although readers and prominent literary figures derive a sense of disorder and loss of self from Dickinson's poems, we must keep in mind the poem's use of particular elements. Poetry requires a lot of self-reflection and reasoning. In many of his poems there is movement in a negative direction. This negative energy could imply a journey to hell or entry into psychological and spiritual depths. His poems were "less direct, alluding to inscrutable silences and things left unsaid." The first line of I Heard a Funeral, in My Brain, reads “I heard a funeral, in my brain,” and the tone of the poem is already depressing. Funerals are not a happy event and the influence of poetry is questionable. The funeral could be a metaphor or an experience of Dickinson. He may be expressing his feelings about a real funeral or the deceased or the funeral is a metaphor for his deep, dark thoughts and feelings. The recurring topic and personification of death in Dickinson's work reinforces the idea that she believed that death is inevitable and will come soon. Another possibility is that thepoems were a way to distract or express the meaning of physical death. According to Dickinson, “it is in this oblivion that the terror lies, not in the process of dying.” He had believed that death was almost a comfortable experience and that the uncontrollable part was the most terrifying. Most of his problems were in his mind. With all the time she had available, she could think and rethink everything. Without her mental disorientation, she would not have been able to create stark, dark literature. The amount of isolation kept the inside of his mind constantly occupied. All this thinking produced vivid images. Concrete images communicate concepts and scenes with sensory language. His use of words representing colors, objects, textures and sounds, etc. It can help readers create a powerful image in their head while reading his poems. He often used symbols in his work. A perfect example of regular use of symbols is the poem given the name I felt a Funeral, in my Brain. At the beginning of the first stanza, the speaker seems to be trying to confront and question death. The poem almost gives the feeling of two different speaking perspectives of the living and the living dead. The length of each line and the pitch of each stanza help establish tone and can also represent symbols. In I Heard a Funeral, in My Brain, the lines and the structure of the lines are reminiscent of an epitaph on tombstones: I Heard a Funeral, in My Brain, and the mourners back and forth kept walking - walking - until it seemed like the Sense was breaking through - And when they were all seated, A function, like a Drum - They kept beating - beating - until I thought my mind was going numb - And then I heard them lift a Box And creak through my Soul With those same Lead Boots, again, Then Space - began to ring, as if all the Heavens were a bell, and Being, but an ear, and I, and the silence, a strange, broken, lonely race, here - and then a plank in reason, broke, and I fell, and down -And hit a World, with each dive,And Finish knowing - then -The dotted lines suggest that ideas and statements come and go quickly. These short dashes can also represent the life of an organism or an idea. Another theory Dickinson believed in is that death is indicated by loud bursts of sound and then instant silence. A real life example would be thunder before silence. Death is sudden and surprising and everything else goes silent. Another comparable scenario is “a clumsy pianist, who stuns the subject with pounding music, before delivering a lightning-like deathblow.” The repetition of the words “negotiation” and “beating” in I Heard a Funeral, in My Brain, helps the reader “feel what the speaker is hearing. Cynthia Griffin Wolff argues that “the speaker is reporting, beyond the grave, what happened at her own funeral.” Another interpretation of the funeral is the death of love for Samuel Bowles. The term "extended metaphor" is a metaphor that continues through multiple sentences in a paragraph or lines in a poem. It is often one sentence and sometimes includes a complete paragraph or stanza. The funeral includes mourners, a service and the departure of a coffin. Dickinson's “Plant of Reason” is a biblical reference to a man crossing the chasm between the world and heaven on a board labeled “Faith.” If the board were to break, the speaker would fall downwards. The decent/drop represents a journey to hell into the psychological and/or spiritual depths. Please note: this is just an example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now..