Encouraged by your encouraging comments, I thought of analyzing another poem in the O/L

syllabus for your benefit. The poem I have selected is A bird came down the walk by Emily
Dickinson.
Emily Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, on December 10, 1830, into a
prominent, but not wealthy, family. She was an introvert, meaning she kept to herself most of
the time and rarely went outside of her home. However, she was gifted with a powerful
imagination and intelligence and she had written more than 1800 poems. Her poetry is
marked by acute observation and rich imagination.
This poem is based on a very ordinary incident. A bird eats a worm and flies away refusing a
crumb offered by the poet who turns this apparently commonplace incident into a poetic
masterpiece with her rich imagination.
The poem begins with the line:A bird came down the Walk-. Do you find anything unusual
in this line? Well, to me, it strikes rather odd. For one thing, we normally say a bird flied
down. It seems the poet wanted to attribute some human quality to the bird. This is further
reinforced by the word Walk. A walk, as a noun, refers to a route or lane used for leisurely
walking. It is similar to a jogging track used by people for jogging or walking. Thus, the bird is
compared to a person who is having a lesurely walk in the evening. This creates slight
humour which contrast sharply with the tension created by the third and fourth lines where
the bird bit an Angleworm in halves/And ate the fellow, raw. Further, the birds apparently
civilized behaviour contrasts sharply with his wild behaviour in eating the Angleworm
raw. The word raw gets an additional weight because it rhymes with the word saw in
the second line. Whether it is civilized or wild, this natural behavior of the bird who is so
far unaffected by the presence of the speaker as the poet says He did not know I saw-.
Further, the word fellow contributes to the playful tone. Obviously, the poet is not shoked
by the birds act. In fact, he presents the nature as it is, both its beauty and wildness, as an
observer. The poet may be also suggesting the cruelty hidden behind the faade of civility in
the society in this stanza. The rhyming pattern abcb continues in the subsequent stanzas.
Now lets look at the first two lines of the second stanza:
And then he drank a Dew
From a convenient Grass
The birds human-like quality is further emphasized in these two lines. Normally we, humans,
take pride in the fact that we are superior to all other species of animals. However, the poet
seems to suggest in these lines that animals are no less superior to humans, in their own
way. The use of the indefinite article a also deserves our attention here. Normally we expect
a drop of dew in the first line. However, the use of a Dew together with the alliteration of
thed sound seem to enhance the poise and refinement of the bird. The sparkling beauty of
the dew also symbolizes the beauty of the pristine nature unspoilt by industrialization. In the
next line the poet uses an unusual phrase: a convenient Grass. The word Grass (again a
glass) rhymes strongly with glass which suggests an echo-pun on glass. This creates a
picture of a person drinking from a glass. Further, the bird finds his food and drinks easily,
may be more easily than humans. These lines also remind me about another poem by D.H.
Lawrence. In this poem called Snake, Lawrence, the narrator is mesmerized by the graceful
behavior of the snake. This is how he describes the way the snake drank water from his
water trough:

He sipped with his straight mouth,

Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,
Silently.
The soft alliteration of thes sound together with the slow, graceful rhythm creates a
tantalizing effect.

This graceful behaviour of the bird in our poem is further highlighted in the next two lines:
And then hopped sidewise to the Wall
To let a Beetle pass
Here, the bird gets aside to let a beetle pass- a very courteous movement indeed! Our bird
seems to know his manners! Doesnt this suggest that animals have their own etiquette?
Surely, the poet seems to be marvel ing at the beauty and gracefulness of the untamed
nature in these lines. Further, in these two stanzas, the poet seems to anthropomorphize the
bird. In other words she attributes human qualities to the bird.
You might also wonder why the poet has used dashes in these lines. The poem is written in
iambic trimeter in the first three lines and iambic tetra meter in the third line in every stanza
except the last stanza and the dashes are occasionally used to break the rhythm. This
breaking of the rhythm suggests that the bird is uneasy and even unsteady in the ground as
its natural habitat is the sky.
In the third stanza, the poet describes the birds frightened behavior after eating the worm:
He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all around
They looked like frightened Beads, I thought
He stirred his Velvet Head
The birds glancing around with rapid, frightened eyes suggests both caution and fear. As
some critics suggest, it is because the bird feels guilty and he is afraid of the consequences
of his cruel act. I dont agree with this idea because it is quite natural for a bird to eat a
worm. Surely we dont expect them to buy sausages from a supermarket? Rather, it may be
a fear common to all animals since they are constantly exposed to various dangers,
especially from predators. In the famous Novel Village in the Jungle (of Beddegama),
Leonard Woolf says:
For the rule of the jungle is first fear, and then hunger and thirst. There is fear everywhere
Even human beings are afflicted with three main types of fear, according to Rathana Sutta:
sambutam tividham bhayam.
The poet compares the birds eyes to frightened bead. The poet personifies the bead in this
line. A bead with its tiny hole and rolling motion is a stunning image to describe birds eyes

as it is light and lustrous. However, it also suggests a certain hard quality in the bird. This
contrasts sharply with the velvet head which suggests certain fluffiness and beauty.
The Fourth stanza opens with the line:
Like one in danger, Cautious,
We are tempted to ask what is the danger?and the reason for his being cautious. Well, as I
mentioned before, a birds natural domain is the sky and thus, he tends to behave rather
clumsilly and nervously in the ground. As such, the above line aptly describes his behaviour
in the ground. The next line marks the turning point in the poem:
I offered him a Crumb,
So far, the poet was just observing the bird as a passive onlooker. But now she intervenes in
the action and offers him a crumb. The poets action may be also symbolic. It might
symbolize mans intervention with nature and perhaps, his attempt to tame the nature. The
action of offering a crumb is also suggestive of the mans condescending attitude towards
animals. However, instead of eating the crumb, the bird takes flight immediately:
And he unrolled his feathers,
And rowed him softer Home
The bird contemptuously rejects the crumb and begins to fly towards home. The birds action
might symbolize mans futile attempt to tame the nature. These two lines also begin a series
of spectacular images used to describe the birds flight. Once in the sky, the bird begins to
appear in all its glory and splendour as it is his natural domain. The smooth actions of
rolling and rowing together with the assonance of the o sound contribute to the fluidity of
the movement. The bird takes off into the sky with so much ebullience like a duck takes to
water, as the saying goes.
The last stanza is the most memorable one in the poem. The poet savours image after image
of exquisite beauty which describe the breathtaking flight of the bird:
Than Oars divide the Ocean,
Too silver for a seam,
Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon,
Leap, plashless as they swim.
In the first line, the birds feathers are compared to the oars which are used to propel a boat
forward. The movement of oars creates hardly any disturbance in the water; likewise, the
birds wings too do not make any disturbance or impact on the sky; Its flight is seamless. It
does not leave any mark in the sky just like oars which do not leave any seam or mark on
the water. The comparison between the ocean and the sky is quite striking. The birds flight
may also symbolize perfect harmony in nature. The assonance of the o sound in the first
line and the alliteration of thes sound in the second line also contribute to the lyrical beauty
of the lines. The word silver has the connotations of gracefulness and glamour in addition to
beauty.

In the next two lines, the birds flight is compared to another scene of breathtaking beauty:
that of butterflies fluttering in the banks of a river. First he compared to birds flight to an
inanimate object (oars) and now he compares them to an animate thing (butterflies). The
poet makes an implied comparison between the butterflies and fish when she says they
swim. It again suggests the smoothness and the gracefulness of the birds flight through the
sky. Plashless, a rather uncommon word, means smooth or fluid.
Through this poem, the poet seems to highlight the both the beauty and the danger of the
untamed nature. Another famous poem called A narrow Fellow in the Grass also deals with
a similar theme.
Hope you have enjoyed my analysis. As you can see, appreciating a poem doesnt mean just
explaining the poem and giving a note covering its theme and techniques only. Instead, we
must pay close attention to the words used by the poet and how he has organized them
create a particular effect and how it contributes to the overall meaning. In short, a poem
should be treated as a living thing with a soul.