Analysis of I heard a fly buzz when I died;

Emily Dickinson 1830 (Amherst) – 1886 (Amherst)



I heard a fly buzz when I died;
The stillness round my form
Was like the stillness in the air
Between the heaves of storm.

The eyes beside had wrung them dry,
And breaths were gathering sure
For that last onset, when the king
Be witnessed in his power.

I willed my keepsakes, signed away
What portion of me I
Could make assignable,--and then
There interposed a fly,

With blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz,
Between the light and me;
And then the windows failed, and then
I could not see to see.


Scheme XAXA BXXX XBCB XDCD
Poetic Form Quatrain  (75%)
Metre 11011111 010111 11010001 010111 01011111 0101001 1111101 1100110 1111101 110111 11101 1101 110101001 010101 01010101 111111
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 484
Words 94
Sentences 4
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 16
Letters per line (avg) 24
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 96
Words per stanza (avg) 23
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 30, 2023

28 sec read
289

Emily Dickinson

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American poet. more…

All Emily Dickinson poems | Emily Dickinson Books

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