My Favorite Poet

Unlike authors of books, I have a much easier time choosing a favorite poet. For me, poetry is something much harder to invest time in reading. Much of the poetry that I have read has been in school. However, one poet has stood out to me and made me hungry for me.

Meet Emily Dickinson. Her life story is a little bit bazaar. For starters, she spent most of her time in one room of her house. She rarely went outside and is known for primarily wearing white. During her life, she wrote a multitude of literary works (though she is primarily known for her poetry.)

Although her poetry is now popular, she only received fame after death. Dickinson choose to publish a select number of pieces during her lifetime, but only anonymously. When she died, her family discovered her massive works and choose to release them to the public.

One of my favorite things about her poems is that she never titled any of them. As a writer, I know how hard it can be to find a title for a piece that you have written. It is awesome to see that one of the best poets of all time never titled anything!

Anyways, to reference her poems most people refer to the first line. They were originally numbered. However over time, using the first line has become more popular.

In total, 1,800 poems were discovered after she died. Four years after her death, they were published and sent out to be discovered by the American people.

The reason that I like her poetry is that it is inspired by darkness. Most of her inspiration came from the cemetery outside her window, her religious upbringing, and the book of Revelations. Due to her muse, many of her poems carry a dark undertone.

My favorite poem by Dickinson is "I heard a fly buzz- when I died" or 591.

The poem focuses on the last moments before death. The new perception that a person takes on when they reach their final moments. How in that moment life is so still that even a fly in the room is noticeable.

Dickinson recognizes how earthly affairs matter no longer. How serenity has come down upon the person. How responsibility has been relinquished.

And then, "I could not see to see-"

That is the final line to the poem.

I believe that this has both a metaphorical and literal meaning. First of all, when you die you can't see. That is a very literal interpretation.

But I believe that there is much more to this than the absence of sight. I believe that when you die, you can no longer see the point. That you can no longer understand why you lived for some of what you lived for. Why humans live for time constraints instead of freedom. Why we worry about tomorrow instead of focusing on today.

I believe that at the point of death, we will use the ability to see the meaningless things in life. All that will be there is the stillness. The peace.

That is my interpretation of Dickinson's poem "I Heard a Fly Buzz - When I died." If you would like to read it and leave your own opinion on what it means, I would be happy to read it!