Yesterday, for Halloween, I didn’t post any of Dickinson’s macabre poems – so today, for Dia De Los Muertos, I’m going to post one of my favorites of her creepy offerings, “I felt a funeral in my brain.”
 | When I’ve taught this poem, kids love it! I generally post the poem for all to see, read it aloud once through, then go back stanza by stanza and ask, “what is (or could be) going on here?” Then I go back and read it through one final time before any discussion. I love the images in this poem, and I love watching the kids' reactions as they realize that the funeral is for the speaker of the poem – and in stanzas three and four, with the tolling of the bell, is likely the sound of the church bell tolling to signify the service going on inside. And the ending is so satisfyingly creepy: And then a Plank in Reason, broke, And I dropped down, and down - And hit a World, at every plunge, And Finished knowing - then - The repetition of the word “and,” a decisively eerie anaphora, moves the poem forward to its haunting end. |
| Check this out: I found someone who wrote a song based on the poem. I do like the song, though I think I would have composed something a little more eerie – and while I do like his work, there is one major gaffe with the lyrics! hat do you think? I’ll tell you my issue with this tomorrow. To see the video and hear the song, click HERE -- or click the pic at the right. |  |
CONTINUED:
Yesterday, for Dia De Los Muertos, I posted Emily Dickinson’s “I felt a funeral in my brain.” Plus, I found a singer/songwriter who performed an original piece based on the poem (see above).
However, I noted that I had an issue with the lyrics. I did enjoy the song (although I think I would have made the tone a bit creepier), but something in the lyrics made me wince immediately – and it occurs :49 seconds into the video. The singer says, for line 5, “And when WE all were seated” instead of “And when they all were seated.”
That change implies that the speaker of the poem is attending a funeral and that is not the case. Instead, the speaker in this poem is the corpse for whom the mourners are attending a funeral – and somehow the deceased person is aware of the sounds and goings on within the church.
I write original songs based on Dickinson’s poetry, so I too play around with the lyrics. I understand that moving, omitting, and/or changing words and lines might occur to fashion the poem into the rhythm and tenor of a song. For example, in this version of “I felt a funeral in my brain,” the songwriter omitted the word “kept” from lines 3 and 7 – but that did not change the meaning of the poem.
However, I don’t think songwriters should make a change that would alter the meaning or the essence of the poem. I wonder why this singer did that?
Yesterday, for Dia De Los Muertos, I posted Emily Dickinson’s “I felt a funeral in my brain.” Plus, I found a singer/songwriter who performed an original piece based on the poem (see above).
However, I noted that I had an issue with the lyrics. I did enjoy the song (although I think I would have made the tone a bit creepier), but something in the lyrics made me wince immediately – and it occurs :49 seconds into the video. The singer says, for line 5, “And when WE all were seated” instead of “And when they all were seated.”
That change implies that the speaker of the poem is attending a funeral and that is not the case. Instead, the speaker in this poem is the corpse for whom the mourners are attending a funeral – and somehow the deceased person is aware of the sounds and goings on within the church.
I write original songs based on Dickinson’s poetry, so I too play around with the lyrics. I understand that moving, omitting, and/or changing words and lines might occur to fashion the poem into the rhythm and tenor of a song. For example, in this version of “I felt a funeral in my brain,” the songwriter omitted the word “kept” from lines 3 and 7 – but that did not change the meaning of the poem.
However, I don’t think songwriters should make a change that would alter the meaning or the essence of the poem. I wonder why this singer did that?
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