Poetry Review Emily Dickinson I Died For Beauty But Was Scarce

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A sad and literally haunting poem, of the kind Dickinson wrote a great deal. The narrator is laid in her (or his) coffin, having died for beauty. This suggests death through taking extreme measures to stay beautiful, being killed by someone drawn to, yet resentful and jealous of beauty, or in despair over lost beauty due to illness or aging. The narrator gets into conversation with someone in another coffin nearby. He, or she has died for Truth. Perhaps some truth came to light leading to murder or execution, or something shocking was found to be true and drove the other deceased to suicide. The strangers pass the time in night-time conversation until their coffins rot, the moss clogs their dead mouths and their names are lost and forgotten as more moss grows over their grave stones. Quite an unsettling poem, with even the comforts of death coming to an end. Arthur Chappell