Theme Analysis

Religion:

In her life, Emily never felt close to God the way people around her did. Her lack of a relationship with God probably has to do with all of her pain. By allowing her pain to basically consume her, there was no opportunity for God and Dickinson to have anything. Sometimes Dickinson's poetry seems sunny and bright about God. At other times, her poems seem to fume with hatred and anger towards God.

Death:

Dickinson believed the Puritan belief that the way a person dies indicates the state of his/her soul. Dickinson believed that death is ultimate truth and ultimate reality. In her poems, Dickinson uses personification to portray death.

Love:

Normally a poem about love would be positive. Dickinson's love poems were very dark, negative and sarcastic. The reason behind this may be that her relationship always had to be a secret and that she never had experienced a normal relationship, whether with a woman or a man.

Pain:

Dickinson had experienced pain throughout her life; she therefore believed that pain played a role in life. Since Dickinson had so much pain, she found a comfortable happiness in pain. Dickinson's poetry may be a bit masochistic because of her views on pain.