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I Felt A Funeral, In My Brain
By Emily Elizabeth Dickinson
I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading – treading – till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through –
And when they all were seated,
A Service, like a Drum –
Kept beating – beating – till I thought
My mind was going numb –
And then I heard them lift a Box
And creak across my Soul
With those same Boots of Lead, again,
Then Space – began to toll,
As all the Heavens were a Bell,
And Being, but an Ear,
And I, and Silence, some strange Race,
Wrecked, solitary, here –
And then a Plank in Reason, broke,
And I dropped down, and down –
And hit a World, at every plunge,
And Finished knowing – then –
Emily Dickinson wrote “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” in 1861, the beginning of what is
regarded as her most creative period. The poem employs Dickinson’s characteristic use
of metaphor and rather experimental form to explore themes of madness, despair, and the
irrational nature of the universe. Dickinson depicts an unnerving series of events based
around a “funeral” that unfolds within the speaker. Starting out deep within the speaker’s
mind, the poem gradually expands to probe cosmic mysteries whose answers only come in the form of silence.
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