Emily Dickinson presents death in the poem Because I Could Not Stop for Death through the use of personification and the use of extended metaphor. William Cullen Bryant presents death through the use of the analogies in the poem Thanatopsis. Although each poet presents death differently, the meanings are similar.In Thanatopsis, Bryant influences the reader to accept death as all living things fate. Bryant explains death by natures laws and the fact that natures creatures must abide by these laws. In lines 26-28, Bryant explains how an individual must abide by these laws and surrender to the earth that nourished the living. To be a brother to the insensible rock and to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain turns with his share, and treads upon. (Bryant; 26/28). Through ones fear of consciousness of time in our lives, Bryant tries to give the reader advice that one must truly accept their life and its mortality.Because I Could Not Stop for Death, Dickinson influences the reader that death is a courteous gentleman instead of a terrifying figure and that sooner or later the gentleman will come to take ones life. Many people arent willing to stop for death, but are taken away. In the poem, the poet puts away concerns of work and leisure. This is a reminder that death is the end of life and energy. The poet rides in a carriage with Death and immortality. During the journey, pleasant scenes of the poets past are passed. Once the carriage passed the setting sun suggests the inevitable end of mortal time. Beyond the sun, the dark earth and dew send chills. This is the final transformation of life to death. The carriage becomes a hearse, and the poet is taken to her grave that is a vacant house of her past. There the poet lives in eternity with God where centuries feel shorter than a single day in life. Dickinson showed Death as a suitor and the journey of death in her imagination, one would wonder if she lived up to her own ...
