The fly serves as a reminder of the banality of death as well as the importance of the meaning bestowed by human perception. According to Eric Wilson, in his essay "Dickinson's Chemistry of Death," "Dickinson, avatar of Janus, takes a double stance […] she approves the power of the scientific method for exploring the corpse while undercutting the validity of scientific conclusions about the enigmas of dying" (Wilson 28)
("Emily Dickinson," Biography and Analysis, The Online Literature Library, 2005) Paul Bray has called Dickinson's sense of oneness or commonality with nature and the animal kingdom "mystical" in its communion, but it is equally possible to see her fellowship as part of a unique religion of 'oneness' between all members of the living animal kingdom, or simply an acknowledgement of the closeness of human beings in spirit to the natural world. (Bray, 1992) The snake is like a fellow the poet does not like, even if he is part of one's fellow species like a disagreeable human
The reader must feel the poet's intake of break at the stanza break, as she suddenly sees the snake. (Montiero, 1992) "The adjective 'narrow' is hardly unusual, but welded to 'fellow' (which in this context is equally common), it takes on a visual-kinesthetic meaning
But for this it would have been difficult to detach its figure from the night, and separate it from the darkness by which it was surrounded. (Dickens 103) The stereotyped image of the skeletal robes specter is the dominant heady idea of what death is and what it means
Since then-tis-eternity, and yet, Feels shorter than the day, I first surmised that Horses; Heads, Were toward Eternity." (Dickinson) Noticing the imperceptible passing of time Dickinson expresses the idea of eternity as if it were simply a day, like any other day
In a literary analysis of the meaning of immorality and the belief in life after death, written in 1900 the topic is given real and firm weight by hundreds of learned men from biblical prophets to Greek philosophers, some in belief and some outside of it. (Gordon) Immortality is clearly one of the most-weighty questions ever debated yet, Dickinson discusses it like she would discuss an article of clothing
None of these make accurate clocks; none are simple to understand. (Park 60) Concepts of time are again treated with so much complexity that many a literary work has been focused on the idea in theory and in reality
In conclusion, Dickinson uses language creatively to describe what happens in the last moments before death. "She mastered her themes by controlling her language." (Anderson, 232)
She creates musical effect with the "buzzing" or sounds of the fly, describing the sound as "blue" (With Blue -- uncertain stumbling Buzz -- Between the light -- and me --). (Eberwein, 156)
In "Safe In Their Alabaster Chambers," Dickinson explores death, one of her most widely explored topics, from the perspective of a tiny spec in the huge universe. Dickinson employs irony from the beginning, by using the word "safe" (Dickinson 1) in reference to resting in a coffin
Although the form of the poem suggests Christianity immediately to the knowledgeable reader, the subject of Christianity itself is not raised until the end of the poem, as a sort of surprise. The Brain -- is wider than the Sky For -- put them side by side The one the other will contain With ease -- and You -- beside The Brain is deeper than the sea For -- hold them -- Blue to Blue The one the other will absorb As Sponges -- Buckets -- do The Brain is just the weight of God For -- Heft them -- Pound for Pound And they will differ -- if they do As Syllable from Sound -- (Dickinson 312) Dickinson's first stanza is easy enough to understand, even if it is posing a sort of paradox
Humble sights and sounds of the everyday are paired with the transcendent. This creates what has been called the 'aesthetics of surprise' in Dickinson's poetry, particularly poetry about death, in which the experience of death can be perceived and rendered into words quite easily, although what death and the afterlife truly is remains unanswerable and outside the realm of the verbal (Lee 175)
The strangeness of the atmosphere created by Dickinson's poems and the creation of such a concrete theology belies the idea that the scope of lyric poetry is always personal in nature, despite Dickinson's frequent use of homely physical objects as metaphors. "Lyric poetry…has often been considered an irrational genre, more expressive than logical, more given to meditation than to coherent or defensible argument" (Zwicky 234) For Dickinson, even her most meditative poems contain a kind of argument interwoven within their textures