I Felt a Funeral in My Brain:

Summary:
• The speaker imagines a funeral in her head, seeing mourners {people
grieving} walking this way and that.
• The mourners get seated and the service begins, but rather than a quiet
religious ceremony, she hears only pounding which makes her feels as though
as her brain is going numb.
• The mourners {them} lift the casket and with boots of lead walk across her.
• Then she hears church bells but is left all alone with silence. She feels
"wrecked".
• Then as the wooden floor of her mind {plank of reason} suddenly breaks, the
speaker falls, hitting worlds on her way down. What's at the bottom of this fall
is unclear because the poem ends abruptly.
1st Quatrain:
She starts the poem in a very clear idea, telling the readers that in this poem I will tell
you about the funeral service that's taking place in my mind. The mourners are
walking quite quickly with a pace back and forth to an extent it causes pressure and a
hole in the mind of the reader. The logic or the reason itself pulled through this hole,
so she is very brilliant in the imagination, but this imagination stands on something
and wants to tell a lot of things. It shows that the logic of the reader is dead. (For sure
the theme here has to do with death, sadness and being under pressure). In the very
beginning of the poem, it is clear that it stands for something which is related to her
own concept and her own reason, so she admits that her knowledge is collapsing. She
makes it clear that the poem is about her state of mind because she says: “that sense
was breaking through”. So, this is about her state of mind which is compared to a
funeral.
It is very important to see the tense used by the poet, the past tense. As if the event
has already happened and now, she is only talking about it. The setting is clear that it
is inside the reader’s brain and it continues to be all the poem.
The sounds of the mourners stand for mysterious forces that make someone feel under
pressure and desperate and unable to use his reason. The beginning of the poem is
revealing the beginning of the reader losing her mind and every
quatrain will reveal another step of that funeral.

2nd Quatrain:

We have a metaphorical funeral (nothing is real). The 2nd step is the service, and we
know people say few words about the dead during the service. So, the mourners take
their seats; however, there are no words. Instead, the speaker says that there is noise
like the sound of a drum beating. She used repetition “beating-beating” to show the
level of the noise. So, the noise is still in the mind of the speaker and it let her mind
become numb, just like she is losing her contact with the world because you use your
senses and logic in order to feel the world around you. The knowledge is collapsing in
each step of the funeral. It is very strange and uncommon service. The drum is used
symbolically to reveal a message (the end/the apocalypse). She is very skillful and she
knows the exact meaning of her words before using them. She is repeating some
words to give musical effect, also in order to show the effect on the mentality of the
speaker.

3rd Quatrain:

The 3rd step is procession. The service ends and the procession begins. The mourners
carry a box (coffin)but the poet didn’t give details about who or what inside the box.
That’s why as readers, we can understand that she is talking about something related
to her state of mind. They then moved across the speaker’s soul which creaks like an
old floor and creaks across her soul with those same boots of lead (heavy boots), so
they were walking at the pressure and to the noise inside the speaker’s mind. She
moved from the inside to the outside when she suddenly said “space” (everything, not
only the atmosphere. It stands for ground, earth, the whole universe) “began to toll”
(ringing of the bell), so the ringing of the bell comes from the whole universe
(space). Even at funerals, we have the toll of the bell; it’s like she wants to say that it
was the end, we will have the burial.

4th Quatrain:

All heavens ring like bells. She is definitely talking about death and burial, and she is
affected by the concept of life after death because every while, she mentions in her
poems the eternal life after death because as Christians, they do believe in that and
this is reflected in her poems. Heaven refers to the sky or to the Christian after life.
So, the speaker feels like she isn’t a human anymore, she says: “And I, and Silence
some strange Race”. She resembles herself to creatures, the speaker is alone in her
own body and mind, so she is not social in a community or interacting with others;
she is solitary. Something made her suffer to an extent since she said: “wrecked”, we
see the level of suffering.

5th Quatrain:

It’s the last stage: the burial. The reason now breaks and the speaker drops down and
down (image of dramatic falling). This image of dramatic falling shows to what extent
the speakers mind has lost control. She said that “finished knowing”, then we have
nothing after “then”. This also says something; to write “then- “means that she can’t
tell what comes next. The rational mind has been shut down. The way the poet ends
the poem is very brilliant and skillful. She can’t continue because when you lose your
mind, logic, reason, you cannot continue, so she stops. We have focus on individuality
(to choose your own way of living) and everything that goes around her but she is
talking about her experience. We have the focus on the mind of the speaker.

She explores death and madness (losing the sense of pressure and logic and
reason) in the whole poem, and reveals the burdens of the society that wrecked
her.
The Soul Selects Her Own Society:
Usually, the title is the first line of the poem. The tile for sure reflects the main idea of
the poem. However, in Emily Dickinson, we don't have a title. The poem is so short
52 words only and of 3 stanzas, but it's rich with many ideas. If we just read the title,
we could understand that she is someone who decided to be isolated "own, selects"
this is her own choice. From the first line of the poem, it's clear that the topic is about
choosing where it's your own choice. The speaker makes her own choice choosing a
companion, certain kind of companionship, a friend, a lover, or a place to remain in
her society. However, we are in front of a situation that we have this choice, not under
force, but by her own decision to choose something according to what she wants to
have.
First stanza: It's clear that the speaker, the lady is no longer outside. We have
someone who is selecting/choosing, shutting doors, and stopping the communication
with the majority. This is only what she presents. We are in front of a lady who's no
longer outside with the people around. The soul is selective here; it's not the person
who selects his/her society. She's talking about the soul, and something spiritual
because at that time the focus was on the soul and the spirit of the individual. The soul
is selective, and it's a feminine soul. She's talking about the "she", and at that time it
was a world dominated by males as well as the society in order to be there and
important figure. Males were very powerful. She shuts the doors as if we are in a
situation she's saying: "this is my soul who doesn't want any more to contact with
such society. This soul that belong to a lady takes the decisions. She's not accepting
the strong male's figure any more. To say that the soul selects her own society means
that her soul is strong and powerful because she chooses her own society. Then, she
closes the door to say that: "you can't decide to tell or ask me to do this and that, I will
choose my own society". She chooses to stop the connection with the world outside.
This choice is kind of power and related to the strong will of people. This is the
decision between the inclusion and the exclusion. According to her: "this is the right
choice, I prefer to be excluded, live in my own society, and that's why she chooses her
soul. To present her soul in this way means that she cares for her spiritual side about
her soul and identity.
Second stanza: She refers to the soul. The soul is unmoved which means that you
aren't affected by any external force. Unmoved, she's very determined. To present
such ideas in a few lines is extraordinary and makes her skillful. Unmoved only one
word because according to her if one-word fits, she doesn't use any other words.
Chariots represent royals; we have the emperor, "at her low gate" it also has her gate.
In these 4 lines, we have the doors are closed now, the soul is unmoved, determined,
she's not affected by any stimulus from the outside. Even by the arrival of the chariots
where they are used in ancient form of carriage that are publicly used to transport
significant people from one side to another as generals and soldiers. So, chariots
symbolize something with high status. The word "unmoved" is repeated to emphasize
and stress her position, and this shows that the soul won't change her position, despite
of the fact that an emperor comes to visit her and kneels in front of her. The emperor
here is chosen here by the poet because it stands for something which is very high and
noble, and it signifies something that is good, respected, distinguished and in order to
show respect to her. To that extent, her soul was important to her according to her
majesty. So, she wants to present something which is very noble and high. This is
how she views herself. At a time where the society is dominated by power of
males, we have this soul in front of us with strong will and very powerful.
Third stanza: Ample nation means the country's society. Even though, the soul
remains unmoved her, she chooses one, and then she comes like a stone. She's like
stone because it has no feelings, insensitive to any kind of requests by people. So, she
chooses someone that's not chosen by other people of her society. She's not like others
or common people. They choose what they want, and I choose something else. She
rejects all obligations or religious or social commitments. She doesn't like to be part
of such commitment, and even if we have an emperor in front of us. If the external
forces try to convince her to change her mind, she won't accept because she has
already taken her own decision. She clearly refuses the outside world. The valves that
allow energy through one direction only are closed now, and she's now a stone, rigid,
hard, strong, and insensitive, and she can't be affected by anything.
In this poem, we don't have a story or journey like the previous one or the journey of
Walt Wittman. We have an expression of an opinion. She expresses her own opinion
about her decision of being excluded and why. Moreover, she describes her strong
personality to tell others: "don't bother yourselves and don't try to convince me
because I'm not going to change my mind. The choice of the word "society" is
important here because the soul selects her own society is not the same as the soul
selects her own world. She uses the word society which means that she has her own
society. She uses words to show what she has in her mind.
Themes of "The Soul Selects Her Own Society":
Individual vs. society: She's after her own choices and what she likes to have.

Because I Could Not Stop for Death:

It's clear that the poem is about death which is the main theme of it. It's clear also
that the word "because" shows that there's a kind of explanation to a certain question.
This poem is so simple in terms of grammar and vocabulary. It's made up of 6
quatrains, and each quatrain consists of 4 lines with regular meter and rhyme. Each
stanza here represents a certain stage. In the symbolic term, we have that journey in
the carriage in front of us with the poet herself, but it's symbolic {out of her
imagination}. This journey is going from life to death in a very simple poem that
starts with a certain stage and then we move to another stage until we reach the grave.
The tense used in quatrains from 1 to 5 is the past, and we use past about things that
happened and finished. However, the tense in quatrain 6 is the simple present to say
that I'm talking right now. I also have the speaker in the first speaker singular. She's
the female speaker talking about death. The setting: we have the carriage ride with
horses, and it's moving in a landscape. We have this ride through a landscape that
represents the different stages or phases of life. We have that mysterious atmosphere,
and we have something we aren't familiar with. In the first quatrain, she's talking that
because in life we can't decide when we are going to die. The first two lines are to
show that we are in situation we cannot. Because, I wasn't ready and didn't expect
death. Maybe I was busy that I could not stop for death. So, instead he came to get
her. The theme is about death so, that's why it makes the poem active and alive. In
front of us there's a scene, a carriage with character or things inside. The speaker
didn't have the choice about when she's going to die, and that's why death in front of
us here as a matter of fact comes and takes people. It's the master of the journey. She
uses the adverb "kindly" as if she's talking about a gentleman who arrived in a
carriage. In the way she presented death, it shows that she's not afraid of death.
Moreover, the setting is carriage which is beautiful place with horses. So, it means
that when de decided to come she was ready. We have this calm tone showing
acceptance. Her tone is that of accepting the whole situation. Here we have she {the
poet} the death and the immortality are in together in the same carriage. Together they
will live the journey. We have certain words that are capitalized "Carriage",
"Ourselves", and "Immortality" that shows emphasis to focus on certain things such as
immortality. This is the technique usually followed by Emily Dickinson in her
writings. The "Death" is also capitalized to show that there's a relation between death
and the speaker, or as if it's presented as a person or character. So, this is the
situation in the beginning of the poem. It's the first stage which is death picking
her up in the first quatrain.
Second quatrain: How are they moving? Why does she describe it like this? While
they are moving, they aren't in hurry. Here death is the one who controls the
situation. The speaker here is just along for the ride, and he {death} decides. "We" is
used here to show that they are a company, this company between her {the speaker}
and death which reflects in a way or another that she's not afraid. She uses also the
word "Civility" to show that he's a gentleman. It's also capitalized to show the
civility of death, and the way he is presented. She presents him in a beautiful way. So,
she has given up her work as well as her free time, she said: "My labor and my leisure
too". I gave him everything, her time and freedom so he controls everything. So, here
we have the slow haste drive with death. So, in the first quatrain we have death
picking up her, and in the second one death is taking control of everything of the
journey and walking slowly in the drive.

Third quatrain: They are moving in the field. Now, she sees in front of her 3
different stages. The first stage is childhood. After passing in front of the school,
they moved to the fields of gazing grain which represents the stage of adulthood, and
the last stage when she says: "we passed the Setting Sun" is the old age. So, here
while we are moving slowly, they pass through the stages of her life. They went by
school where children are playing during their break time, they are arranged in a
circle, and they moved in the fields of crops. In fact, she's looking back at her life; she
saw different stages/phases of her own life which are childhood that is represented by
the children playing in the school and having fun. We have also the stage of adulthood
represented by the fields of gazing grain; the fields here are personified, and they
symbolize by a way or another the work of life, time of working hard, and time for
labor. Then we have the stage of old age represented by the setting sun because it
signifies the end of life. The movement in this poem is horizontal; they are moving in
the landscape from one place to another. She's viewing her life in front of her one
stage after the other. In this quatrain, we have the flashback. At the beginning, we
have the picking, then we have the slow movement under the control of death, after
that we have this flashback that represents everything of her life.
Fourth quatrain: She said we passed the setting sun. so, "he" here refers to the
setting sun {in the first line} which is a personification. She refers to them {tippet,
tulle, and gossamer} to say that she was wearing at that moment something which is
light, and not heavy. She's talking about the dress that maybe is suitable for a wedding
representing a new beginning of life. She starts by the sun, and as the sun passed
them, she's not sure we have the dew was fallen and she felt cold. This dress wasn't
that heavy to make her feel warm. The scarf was also light. This sense of quivering
and cold because she's coming closer to death. The sun is gone, and everything
around here doesn't provide her with the sense of warm. There's no warmth because
the temperature of the body is decreasing, and that's why it's dark and cold. We have
that inner feeling of the speaker is coming out near death. They are moving closer to
the death. The light dress also enhances and increases the feeling of coldness. That's
why the atmosphere around them is very cold. So, little by little we passed the
children, the gazing fields, and now after the setting of the sun is my condition and
situation of her soul and inner soul.
Fifth quatrain: The house she talked about is emerged to below the ground. The roof
here is barely visible can't be seen clearly from the ground. So, they reached this place
of the grave yard. We reached the stage of the burial spot. So, here she's coming near
death in the carriage, and here we have their second stop which means the end of the
journey in the poem. The first stop was when the death stopped to pick her. The first
stop was made by death, but here together they stop, and the house indicates and
represents the place of burial, and this place isn't in the earth, it's under the earth that's
why it's the grave. She doesn't say things in that way, she uses her own imagination to
describe things in a very beautiful and special way. She's moving towards a new
beginning and different.
Sixth quatrain: Since she's moving to a new life, she uses here the present tense.
Since that day, centuries had passed, but in reality, it feels less than a day according to
her. This is the house and place of death they hid it in the direction towards eternity.
When she says: " since then" it's the sign of the passage of time we have. There were
centuries between the time of the journey and the poem's time. The poem's time is at
the last quatrain using the present tense, and the journey which is in the past centuries
ago. The poet believes that death is related to immortality. This also justifies why she
describes the dress, the gown, and the tippet in that way because they represent
wedding or celebration.
This poem is the most celebrated poem by Emily Dickinson.
Here we find, the theme of death dominating, but at the same time the sense of
acceptance. We don't see the sense of pessimism. We have the strong will of
determination. Something that's not negative looking at death.
Romanticism is a movement based on:
• Imagination and escapism
• Individuality,
• finding spirituality in nature,
• looking for the past for wisdom, and
• finding a hero in the common man
Many of Dickinson’s poems reflected this Romantic Movement. In addition,
Dickinson used metaphors that assigned physical qualities to the feeling of "hope",
and symbols {or objects} to represent an entirely different meaning that was much
deeper and more significant.