Because I Could Not Stop For Death He Kindly Stopped For Me Analysis

Often, movement is directly proportional to a person’s level of tranquility. If a person is moving quickly, then that person’s adrenaline levels are generally increased, meaning the person is not calm. On the other hand, a person who is moving very slowly tends to be calm, relaxed or even sedated. The poet uses “movement” in her words, otherwise known as rhythm, to show the relaxed state of the speaker. Utilizing tools such as iambic meter and alliteration, the poet creates the calming rhythm portrayed as the carriage movement. For example, the speaker’s iambic meter accentuates her calm mood. The beat underneath her words, “Because I could not stop for Death -/ He kindly stopped for me-“(1-2), allows the reader to feel how the carriage is moving. The soft rocking back and forth continues to highlight the calm that the reader is graced with. As the poem continues that same rocking continues even unto the end of the poem with the verses; keeping the smooth …show more content…
In the case of Line 20, the poet uses this pause to signify a significant mood change. The mood for Lines 1-19, which encompass the romantic carriage ride, is calm and relaxed, lackadaisical even. The dash that changes the entire form of the poem, in line 20, shows the moment in which the speaker realized that she has died. The tone of the speaker in line 20, “the comice- [was] in the ground” shows that for the first moment the speaker is scared or even shocked, but the overall mood remains calm. Even the dash between “the cornice” and “in the ground” demonstrates the pause between when she realizes that she is viewing the top of the house, the grave, in which she is supposed to live is in the ground. “Because I Could Not Stop for Death” by Emily Dickinson allows to gain another feeling about dying, tranquility, and provides an answer for the philosophical question “where do we go when we