Because I Could not Stop for Death: the Fulfillment of the After-life

When first reading this poem the first line alone seemed to mean to work hard or maybe the author is too busy to stop for anything. But upon further reading, it takes another meaning. Is death meaning the personified meaning as in like a grim reaper? And could immortality be a symbol of the authors’ soul that can be thought of as immortal?

The poem has a rhyming scheme of every other line, Death – ourselves and me – immortality, etc. The writer is talking in an author voice style. Being very personal like and sounds like her personal thoughts. The narrative perspective in this poem is personal there is a lot of use of “I”. It reads like a personal retelling of the experience. So far, the characters in this passage. She is being straightforward in the sense that the lines are painting a scene that makes sense and does not require lots of pondering. This passage contains figurative language in the sense that concepts such as death and immortality are personified.

In this passage, the author depicts how she and death were driving around in the carriage. As if she is being taken along for the ride and cannot control what death would do. Only resign herself to it. With death taking his time and making her calm down.

In the third and fourth passage further, describing her journey with death they go by a school, grain field and setting sun. The interesting part is when she starts describing how she feels chills because of her thin clothing. Which at first read as if the end was near for her because she mentions how the sun passed them and getting cold similar to how a corpse is cold.

The fourth and fifth passage seems to describe the destination of their travel. Because once they arrive at this house she mentions in the fifth paragraph that centuries have gone by yet it feels shorter than a day. Implying that this is where the journey ends.

The general Idea of this poem seems to be dealing with life after death. Or to be more precise what happens when you die. The author mentions how she’s being taken around for a ride and this brings up thoughts of a soul crossing over similar to Greek mythology where Charon takes newly deceased souls across the river Styx, but this poem describes it in a much more personal fashion.