Mac’s April 1st Work

In the poems read for class I noticed a pattern of the image of the House. The two poems that struck me most with the House imagery was Poem 466 and Poem 479.

Poem 479, or “Because I could not stop for death,” is a popular poem for the imagery of dying, but I want to focus primarily on the 2nd to last stanza.

“We paused before a House that seemed

A Swelling of the Ground –

The Roof was scarcely visible –

The Cornice – in the Ground -“

The third line in the stanza caught my attention, because it was not the only time Dickinson references the “Roof,” of the house. In this stanza the house and roof appears more dark and dreary, opposed to the house in Poem 466.

“Of Chambers as the Cedars –

Impregnable of eye –

And for an everlasting Roof

The Gambrels of the Sky -“

In this stanza, the house and roof seem almost angelic, with the use of the words “everlasting,” and “sky.” The house, in Poem 466, being displayed in the sky can symbolize a more peaceful paradise. Whereas the house, in Poem 479, is a “Swelling of the Ground,” so it appears more dark and mysterious. Both poems use a house to symbolize eternity, while one is an everlasting home in the sky, the other is a broken down dwelling of the ground. This gives a different point of view in Dickinson’s references to death.

At the beginning of Poem 479, Dickinson writes about death as if he were courting her, but by the fourth stanza the gentle nature of death becomes more chilling. The house in this poem has been swallowed by the earth, the reader no longer has a home and must continue on with death. The reader left her home for death because he was tricked them, and in doing so, gave up where they live, their home.

In Poem 466, Dickinson writes that the house is full of “possibilities,” everything in the house is the best. At the end of the poem, dickinson writes,

“The spreading wide my narrow Hands

To gather Paradise -“

This house is a Paradise, whereas the house in Poem 479 is gone for eternity. The two different visuals for the houses struck me the most while reading the poems, because while there are other poems that mention the house these poems were in stark contrast with one another’s visual.

I’m curious to see if anyone else noticed the usage of the house in Dickinson’s poems. If you did notice the imagery, what do you think the house could symbolize for Dickinson? Is the house a paradise or not, maybe its a symbol of domesticity? I’m interested to see what y’all think.

This is my April 1st Work