Dickinson Poem

Poems are often written in a language that makes the meaning unclear. The shorter poems are easier to read because they do not have as many words to decode. But the meaning even a short poem is hard to understand. However, it is this complex language that makes poems what they are. It forces readers to read carefully and get the message out of in a not entirely direct way of saying it. Emily Dickinson’s “The Name of it is Autumn” has a special focus on red and blood. What is going on in this poem is hard for me to figure out. The blood and veins could be a symbol of the bloodshed of war, and the thing be called autumn could be war itself.
The entire poem is focused on the color red and relates to blood. She says “the hue of it is blood” (line 2) and speaks of “scarlet rain” (line 8). This has a morbid sound to it, as it makes me imagine raining blood. The thought of a hill being an artery and vein makes me thing of bursting veins because war is full of weapons that cut veins. It could be from these “veins” that the blood in the poem is coming from. Dickinson’s use of blood and red shows how much death is a part of war and how it overtakes simple areas of life such as rain.
Poems are hard to understand because they do not follow the idea of a story. They do not introduce a character that goes through actions. They often just start with images and describe something, such as the war, without telling a story that can be followed. I like that they make readers have to think and consider what they mean. It also leaves them open to interpretation and gives the readers the ability to make them personal.