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Dickinson's After great pain

© Linda Sue Grimes

Emily Dickinson's poetry reveals the poet's philosophy of life: a great and intense attention to the details of daily living and an unending concern with spirituality. Her own suffering prompted her to examine that phenomenon. She examined so she could understand, and her poems help us understand our own human predicament. Her poem, "After great pain," is an example of her work that shows her deep understanding of human suffering. Although Dickinson lived in the nineteenth century, her poem, "After great pain," expresses the same human feelings common to any century. This poem portrays the experience of a person who has suffered severely. The speaker does not identify the cause of the suffering; it could be the death of a friend or the break up of a relationship. The cause is not important, for the purpose of this poem is to dramatize the effect such suffering has on the human body and mind.

In the first two lines, "After great pain, a formal feeling comes / The nerves sit ceremoniously like tombs," the speaker claims that the nerves are the first part of the body to register the pain. The nerves become stiff and empty and cold. "Formal" is associated with a particular form, like a wedding, funeral, or military celebration. All of these events require a certain kind of clothing and special procedures. The nerves experience a "formal feeling" because they are not relaxed but feel stiff like formal clothing or events. The phrase "ceremoniously like tombs" further details the formality along with the cold hardness of a place where dead bodies are stored.

The lines "The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore, / And Yesterday, or Centuries before?" show that time no longer seems clear. The pain has made the passage of time stand still or speed up. The speaker feels uncertain about when she first experienced the pain; it could have happened "yesterday" or hundreds of years ago. The "stiff Heart" is almost dead itself, another example of hardness or formality.

This poem continues with cold, harsh images: "The feet mechanical go round / Of Ground or Air or Ought." Her feet move mechanically, not willfully, as usual; she's just going through the motions of life, not really feeling what she's doing. When a person is happy or functioning with normal emotions, life seems to flow and events seem to move easily from one to another; life is flexible, not mechanical. But when a person is tragically unhappy, one's will is stifled, making it difficult to carry on daily routines. The speaker is just trying to survive or get through the day.

Dickinson

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