The fly and 465

A detailed Summary of The fly and 465

Emily Dickinson in her poem #465, covers the subject of death in a way that I have not seen before. She delves right into the last sounds she heard when the narrator died, which was a fly buzzing. The last actions of this world are concluded by the assigning

of "keepsakes", the last few tears while waiting "the King". And now, in the midst of this silence, Emily chooses to introduce the buzzing of a fly. This common household pest's incessant buzz becomes all the dying can hear. The fly is a significant part of the poem and in this essay, I will give examples as to why and how.

I think the fly has special significance in the poem. Beelzebub was often portrayed as a fly: Lord of the Flies, and there is a strange tone about this poem, as though the dying person is a controller, an organizer, a cold person in fact, her last steps towards death were so calculated, "The Eyes around-had wrung them dry-/And Breaths were Gathering firm/ for the last Onset-when the King/Be witnessed-in the Room."(ln 5-8). She is waiting for King (God) to come and take her to the after life. She has calculated death, then this pest "interposes" itself , "Between the light and me"(ln14) her peacef

poem, though wonderfully precise and startlingly original, seems to me less important for a reader than the message' of the poem, which can be taken as a wry comment on how everything, even the privacy of death, can be ruined by the commonest thing, or as something as darkly symbolic as a vision of hell itself. It leads us to the unknown but then gently lets us down, refusing to give us the knowledge we want. The narrator, being no longer of this earth, cannot view what is to come through their earthly "windows".

final experience of life, a perfect example of how something so ordinary, even trivial, can loom so terribly large it can overwhelm and completely blot out the spirituality. I somehow feel that when Emily Dickinson wrote this poem, she was in pessimistic mood, maybe even doubting the faith that normally sustained her. The language in the

makes it doubly clear that the moment of vision (windows/eyes failing) has been stolen from her and that, in effect, the fly has won by becoming the very last thing the speaker hears, and imagines - I think the fact that she sees it as "Blue is not because she can see it but because she is imagining it. The irritation the fly introduces to the scene also becomes her

The fly suddenly opens up the possibility that all is not about to proceed as expected, even after death. And the fact that this is also a posthumously written poem, "when I died,"(ln 1) suggests that there's some

Some common words found in the essay are:
King God, Emily Dickinson, Lord Flies, Onset-when King/Be, Geoff Eng, Breaths Gathering, dying person, storm clouds, emily dickinson, moment vision, buzzing fly, dickinson wrote, waiting king, common household,

Approximate Word count = 969
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English