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Emily DickinsonA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
“The Brain—is wider than the Sky” by Emily Dickinson (1862)
“The Brain—is wider than the Sky” details the immense power of the mind. Not only is it larger than the sky but it’s “deeper than the sea” (Line 5) and equal to the “weight of God” (Line 9). The supreme authority Emily Dickinson attributes to the brain connects this poem to “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” and its recreation of an authentic experience of death.
“Because I could not stop for Death” by Emily Dickinson (1863)
In this poem, death doesn’t come across as oppressive. There are no adversarial mourners or noxious sounds. Instead death is a “kindly” man who takes the speaker on an excursion to see the different stages that compose life. Just as “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,” ends on a “then—” (Line 20), a hypothetical afterlife, “Because I could not stop for Death” also doesn’t give death the final say, as the speaker links themselves to immortality.
“Sonnet V: If I should learn, in some quite casual way” by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1917)
In this sonnet, the female speaker engages with death in an external, tangible way: On a train, the speaker learns from another passenger’s newspaper that a former lover died.
By Emily Dickinson
A Bird, came down the Walk
Emily Dickinson
A Clock stopped—
Emily Dickinson
A narrow Fellow in the Grass (1096)
Emily Dickinson
Because I Could Not Stop for Death
Emily Dickinson
"Faith" is a fine invention
Emily Dickinson
Fame Is a Fickle Food (1702)
Emily Dickinson
Hope is a strange invention
Emily Dickinson
"Hope" Is the Thing with Feathers
Emily Dickinson
I Can Wade Grief
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Cleaving in my Mind
Emily Dickinson
If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking
Emily Dickinson
If I should die
Emily Dickinson
If you were coming in the fall
Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz — when I died
Emily Dickinson
I'm Nobody! Who Are You?
Emily Dickinson
Much Madness is divinest Sense—
Emily Dickinson
Success Is Counted Sweetest
Emily Dickinson
Tell all the truth but tell it slant
Emily Dickinson
The Only News I Know
Emily Dickinson
There is no Frigate like a Book
Emily Dickinson