Each Sunday in April, National Poetry Month, I've been looking at one poem and commenting on it.
I memorized this poem years ago, and it still fascinates me. Who but Emily Dickinson would have thought to write a poem in the voice of a person who's already died, who's remembering the last thing she saw -- a fly -- a blue fly at that, the kind that swarms around dead things? The fly lives on decay, but at the same time it's the most alive thing in the room.
Life and death are located in the same room and, most profoundly, in the same body. They need each other. Even the speaker needs to be both dead and alive, to speak the poem.
[I heard a fly buzz]
I heard a Fly buzz -- when I died --
The Stillness in the Room
Was like the stillness in the Air --
Between the Heaves of Storm --
The Eyes beside -- had wrung them dry --
And Breaths were gathering firm
For that last Onset -- when the King
Be witnessed -- in the Room --
I willed my Keepsakes -- Signed away
What portion of me be
Assignable -- and then it was
There interposed a Fly --
With Blue -- uncertain stumbling Buzz --
Between the light -- and me --
And then the Windows failed -- and then
I could not see to see --
-- Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
Learn more about Fleda Brown her on her Web site, fledabrown.com
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