Because I could not stop for death

 “Because I could not stop for Death,/ he kindly stopped for me;/ the carriage held but just ourselves/ and Immortality.” This is the opening stanza of the poem “Because I could not stop for death” by Emily Dickinson. This is a poem Dickinson wrote, much like the majority of her other pieces, with a theme of the death. There are three characters in the poem: the speaker, death and immortality. And the three of them are riding in a carriage together; death is driving while Immortality and the speaker are in the back. This drive symbolizes the speakers life, and how death is with us the whole way until the end. Oddly enough, she speaks of death as if he is considerate. She makes reference to his “kindness” and “civility”, and how he “slowly drove,/  he knew no haste”. This shows that the speaker believes that death is not rushing her life. He wants her to enjoy it. However, in the end she references how she “surmised the horses' heads were toward eternity.” So this indicates that she has died and passed on to “eternity”. This type of gloomy tone is not uncommon for Emily. A great deal, if not all of her poetry has the same theme of death and depression. She spent a great deal of her life isolated and her poetry reflects upon her loneliness. Majority of people believe that most of the characters she created in her poetry represent her own state of want. For example the speakers in both “Hope is the thing with feathers” and “I felt a funeral, in my brain” display that same sense of want. In "hope is the thing with feathers" the speaker alludes to her desire for hope. Much like in "I felt a funeral, in my brain" the speaker is desperately searching for peace of mind. Both of which Emily Dickinson was not abundant with either. This clarifies her connections to these themes and desires.