Dickinson commences the poem with the use of personification in regards to Death. Death’s calling upon the narrator—who is …show more content…
She claims that centuries have passed, but all that time still “feels shorter than a day” (1.22). This statement reveals the relativity of time: though hundreds of years have gone by, they are nothing compared to the greatness of her single “wedding day” with Death. The last two lines of “Because I could not stop for Death” show that the woman may not have fully believed in “Eternity” at first. While riding with Death and Immortality in the horse-drawn carriage, she “surmise[s]” (1.23) they are heading for perpetuity. The word surmise does not simply mean “guesses” or “wonders,” but rather “suspects”—the woman had a certain amount of doubt in an afterlife, perhaps initially wondering if there even was any at all. Now she knows that there is someplace that exists even after the place she is currently sharing with