MY LIFE HAD STOOD - A LOADED GUN

by Emily Dickenson

My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun -
In Corners - till a Day
The Owner passed - identified -
And carried Me away -

And now We roam in Sovereign Woods -

And now We hunt the Doe -

And every time I speak for Him -

The Mountains straight reply -

And do I smile, such cordial light

Upon the Valley glow -

It is as a Vesuvian face

Had let its pleasure through -

And when at Night - Our good Day done -

I guard My Master's Head -

'Tis better than the Eider-Duck's

Deep Pillow - to have shared -

To foe of His - I'm deadly foe -

None stir the second time -

On whom I lay a Yellow Eye -

Or an emphatic Thumb -

Though I than He - may longer live

He longer must - than I -

For I have but the power to kill,

Without--the power to die--

I know that there are a lot of other interpretations of this poem, such as a woman in a state of rage, but I looked at this as a poem from the "Guns" point of view.  I had written poems such as this when I was younger, imagining what something inanimate might say or do.  I wrote one from the perspective of my truck talking to a semi-truck, so that is what initially went through my mind.  That and, in the first stanza when it describes the gun as being in the corner, I thought of an old gun I found in the back of my grandmother's closet that was my grandfathers and she never knew was there...or had forgotten about it.  (I wish that I had been older and convinced them to keep it, because I have a feeling it was an antique and valuable.) 

    In the second stanza, I imagine the hunter, or owner, shooting the gun and the sound is what reverberates from the mountains.  The gun is speaking for the hunter and the sound of the gun firing is what echoes in the peaceful mountains.  In the third stanza, I imagine a glow from the gun as it fires which brings it pleasure.  Contentment. The fire of the gun and that of the Vesuvius glow are similar in the mountains.  The gun is content to be fulfilling it's purpose after being in the corner for so long, and that contentment is shown in the glow of the fire...fire of the bullet, or fire of the hunter's cigar match.  

       

Vesuvian Glow

                                                

                                      

                                       

Speaking to Mountains & Reply

   

                                                                                                   

                               

Eider Duck

The role of the gun when the day is done is to guard the hunter.  As the hunter lays on the feathers of the eider-duck, the gun is there to protect him from any enemies.  The gun does not feel, but knows that when it's "Yellow Eye" meets the enemy, the enemy dies.  The gun only has the power to kill, not to die.  It also know that it's power to kill is unmatched and is a perfect shot.  I really liked the line, "None stir the second time - on whom I lay a Yellow Eye -"  I feel a real power in the last stanza.

"The Yellow Eye"

                                                                 

Works Cited

Dickenson, Emily.  “My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun - 1863.  The Norton Introduction to Literature, ed. Kelly J. Mayes, Shorter 11^th ed, New York: Norton, 2013, pp. 783-784.