"The way I read a letter's this:" - Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson was a unique poet that does not fit well into any specific literary category. She wrote many, many poems, that all became incredibly popular after her death. She wrote about any number of things, and her poems are very diverse. Some of them are incredibly literal and have nothing hidden in their meaning, but there are also some that are completely loaded with hidden meaning and other interpretations, so it is often hard to figure out what one will be getting in any given poem. I read a poem by Emily Dickinson that was called "The way I read a letter's this:". This poem basically talks about the speaker reading a letter from their lover. It talks about how the person wants to hide in the very back of their room and open the letter very secretively, so no one else can see the beauty of it or can feel how intimate it is. She is trying to show how meaningful and heartfelt that kind of thing can be, and how important they are to the person that receives them. Emily Dickinson talks all about how she checks every step of the way that no one is following her or sneaking in to see the letter. She talks about how she constantly feels for the letter, and makes sure that there is no way that she could drop it anywhere along the way. She talks about hiding in the corner so that she will be the only one to see how sacred and pure and amazing it is. She wants to make sure that she feels the full effect of the letter and all of the emotions that go along with it, so she makes sure to go into a private room that may well be a sanctuary for her. She talks about how she feels after reading the letter and soaking up all of the goodness that it can give to her. She talks about how much she wants her lover and how being with her lover would be heaven to her. Not the conventional heaven, but her heaven. This poem is very literal and it would be hard to take it different ways. It does not relate to Christianity, because this letter is more between lovers than it would be between a father and a son. It might be mildly awkward for people in those positions to have those feelings for each other, so it is difficult to think about. There is no hidden meaning that Christ wrote letters or received letters from lovers, so Christianity does not fit. There is not a hidden meaning, because only lovers should have these feelings for each other, because it would be awkward for family members to feel this way about each other. Friends might be able to feel this way about each other, but they might want something more with the other person if they feel this way. This poem is pretty simplistic, but it is still very meaningful and shows a lot of depth and emotion.

Dickinson, Emily. "24. “The Way I Read a Letter’s This.” Part Three: Love. Dickinson, Emily. 1924. Complete Poems." Bartleby.com: Great Books Online -- Quotes, Poems, Novels, Classics and Hundreds More. Web. 21 Mar. 2011.

"Érudit | Romanticism on the Net N38-39 2005 : Mayer | Finding Herself Alone: Emily Dickinson, Victorian Women Novelists, and the Female Subject." Érudit. Web. 22 Mar. 2011. .