Death Watch

Since May 15, the 138th anniversary of Emily Dickinson’s death, I’ve been posting some of my favorite poems of hers about death and grief.  Today I have “The last night that she lived,” another poem centered on the Victorian practice of the “death watch.”

This is such a poignant poem of grief, and I’ve always found it to be quietly eerie.  There are so many images I love in this poem.

The first stanza, the fact that “It was a common night” – “Except the Dying – this to us / Made Nature different.”

The second stanza, how “We noticed smallest things” – “Things overlooked before” – that are not “Italicized – as ‘twere.”

The image of the third stanza as family members pace between room “where Those to be alive / Tomorrow were.”

The description of the passage of time in line 18 -  “It was a narrow time” – and how the souls of onlookers were “too jostled” even to speak.

The comparison in the sixth stanza of the dying person to a reed which “bent to the water, struggled scarce / Consented, and was dead.”

And then that final stanza with its final primping before “an awful leisure was / Belief to regulate” – a grievous time as those around the room reflected upon the loss, but I also particularly love the entanglement of the idea of even questioning one's overall beliefs of life and death.

Check out this article on funerary practices of the Victorian age, HERE -- and this article, “Memento Mori ~ Victorian Era Post Mortem Photography” HERE.