Joshua Mageno

English 305
9-29-14
One Last Ride
Dickinson writes "Because I could not stop for Death" using six stanzas, each with four
lines or quatrains. This is common in old church hymns. Perhaps Dickinson was using her
irreverent humor to show the lighter side of the typical funeral dirge by writing this in the same
style. Included in her story are the funeral carriage and the eventual stop at the cemetery.
Typical illustrations of Death are dark and foreboding. Death is usually described as
wearing a large cloak and carrying a scythe therefore Dickinson attributes kinder qualities to
Death. He comes not to abruptly cut the narrator down, but to sweep her away with a smile and
a carriage ride through town and countryside.
The poem follows a steady meter. The rhythm alternates between an iambic tetrameter
and an iambic trimeter. The continuity of this type of meter in the first three stanzas gives the
poem an easy to read flow. It moves slowly, as if we are watching a funeral procession. The
fourth stanza is a bit different because the meter is switched, but then returns back in the fifth and
sixth stanzas.
The punctuation of this piece is to be admired as it sets the pacing for the story and gives
the reader great places to pause and reflect. The reader is bombarded by the dashes, which cause
them to pause and be curious. The single period shows itself after the word "Immortality".
Dickinson does this to show there is nothing beyond the immortal. For much of the poem you
want to read faster, but Dickinson slows you down and draws it out with the use of the dashes.
Dickinson starts her poem telling us the narrator could not stop for death. She draws in
the reader in the same genteel way death comes to pick up the narrator. The caller, death, picks

her up in a carriage and takes her out in the early afternoon. This resembles the courting rituals
of the time which Dickinson lived. Death and the narrator stay out into the evening while
passing many things.
The school, fields of grain, and the sunset all give the reader a sense of time and
movement. The imagery Dickinson utilizes lends itself to great interpretation for the reader. The
idea of Death taking you on a carriage ride is a calm and enjoyable affair. The school they pass
and the children who strove at recess is the very opposite of calm. School playgrounds with
children present are a loud and busy place.
Quite a few are playing games which result in a winner and a loser. The word strove
denotes a struggle or competition of sorts. These children are an example of the human struggle
to survive and competition with others throughout life. There are multiple means by which
humans compete then and now in the present age. People compete in job performance, money
making, material possessions to name a few.
The narrator and Death pass a field of gazing grain and the setting sun. These two
illustrations bring the reader back to calm and quiet thoughts once again. The fields and the sun
are nature devoid of any human element; but Dickinson uses these with great meaning. The
grain just standing and perhaps even swaying gently in the breeze is a great representation of
older adult life. Humans at this point in their lives generally have put away the ideas of
competition and struggle.
Adults want to just relax and enjoy the rest of their days on earth. When the sun sets,
light turns into darkness, the setting sun then becomes the symbol for the end of life. Death has
taken the narrator from this life and there will be no escape for her. Dickinson shows the reader

here all will come to this place as it is inevitable. Yet there is no terror here, peace seems to flow
abundantly on this voyage.
This peace of mind allows the narrator to focus on what she is wearing. The dress and
scarf combination she is wear is made of a fabric so sheer they could be described as cobwebs.
So now the reader is deciphering the idea which the narrator may not make it away from Death
and get back home safely. Dickinson could be using this as a spiritual representation of the
afterlife. This idea allows the reader to stumble into the fifth stanza and began to tie the story
and its outcome to a conclusion.
The outing with Death has now come to a neighborhood of sorts. This section of town
has houses which seem to bulge out of the earth. The narrator explains the buildings frame and
roof are barely distinguishable. Death slows the ride and allows his date to look upon her own
grave. This description gives the reader further insight into what Dickinson's illustration about
the macabre overtones of the poem.
From this slight stop at the cemetery the narrator allows us to finally know it has been
centuries since her death. The intensity of the piece drops and calm comes over the reader. She
tells us it feels shorter than the day since she died. This calmness is Dickinson's way of
explaining her position on life after death. "Because I could not stop for Death" is a poem with a
straight forward meaning, yet allows us to question our own views of death and the afterlife.