Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


CLOCK by EMILY DICKINSON

Poet Analysis

First Line: A CLOCK STOPPED - NOT THE MANTEL'S
Last Line: THE DIAL LIFE AND HIM.
Subject(s): CLOCKS; TIME;

A clock stopped -- not the mantel's;
Geneva's farthest skill
Can't put the puppet bowing
That just now dangled still.
An awe came on the trinket!
The figures hunched with pain,
Then quivered out of decimals
Into degreeless noon.
It will not stir for doctors,
This pendulum of snow;
The shopman importunes it,
While cool, concernless No
Nods from the gilded pointers,
Nods from the seconds slim,
Decades of arrogance between
The dial life and him.



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