They shut me up in Prose —

They shut me up in Prose —

As when a little Girl
They put me in the Closet —
Because they liked me "still" —

Still! Could themself have peeped —
And seen my Brain - go round -
They night as wise have lodged a Bird
For Treason - in the Pound -

Himself has but to will
And easy as a Star
Abolish his Captivity —
And laugh — No more have I —
                                                                         J613,   F445 (1862)


There is quite a bit of power in this poem as Dickinson likens being shut up in “Prose” to being stuck in a closet for not being quiet enough as a girl. It’s a critique on art, gender, and freedom in general.
        Two narratives emerge: the present and ongoing conflict where “They” inflict Prose on the poet, and the past where “They” restricted her freedom in her childhood. One narrative illuminates and informs the other as in both cases the poet’s irrepressible drive to express herself is under attack. In both cases the poet survives to scoff at the would-be prose/quiet enforcers.

The first line is ironic: clearly no one ever really shut Emily Dickinson up in prose. But what she may be saying is that she feels as if she were in a prose (dull, commonplace, uninspired) prison. Her letters reveal a shallow mother, a ponderously lawyerly father, and interminable sermons at Amherst’s First Church of Christ, (to say nothing of school lectures). Dickinson’s quick and startling wit, her fierce and original passions, and her nonconformity (even, perhaps, her self-mythologizing) would indeed have been under societal and family pressure. Except for her beloved sister-in-law Sue, with whom she had a very troubled relationship, and maybe the mysterious “Master,” Dickinson would have been pressured or cajoled on all sides, even by her chosen poetry Preceptor, Thomas Higginson, to rein herself in.

Part of this reining in involved gender expectations. A little girl should be quiet. A young lady should be proper and aiming to marry. A grown woman should be self sacrificing. Another reining-in involves art. Dickinson’s poetry was ahead of its time, difficult to understand, often shocking in implication. Other poets of her day (excepting Whitman) were extolling flowers, spring, and death in much more conventional terms and in much more conventional poetic and metrical form.
        But perhaps more fundamentally, the poem has to do with freedom. Dickinson identifies here with the bird, a familiar image for her, representing spirit, hope, and freedom. She, like the wayward bird, has been confined in the pound, an enclosure to confine stray creatures. But then the poet scoffs at the idea. What, you think that shutting me up can keep me still? My body, yes, certainly you can restrain that. But you can no more quiet my brain than you can impound a bird for treason. All it has to do is fly away, over the fences or through the bars, laughing at its erstwhile jailors. It would be as “easy as a Star” for it to escape – it only has to “will” it.
         Interestingly, her bird is impounded for “Treason” – a laughable thought, but I doubt that the poet tossed that charge in randomly. She, too, must have been made to feel that, like a traitor, she was in some way betraying her community and culture.


When I read this poem I envision a swan in a family of ducks. Perhaps I fixated too early on “The Ugly Duckling”.  But unlike that fable, in this poem Dickinson makes it quite clear that she knows she is the swan. She is not repentant, not subdued. As she famously said to her niece as she closed her bedroom door behind them and pantomimed turning a key, “It’s just a turn – and freedom, Matty!” Irony again. Confining herself to her room, to her father’s grounds, was to Dickinson her greatest freedom.

Modern readers might also think of Maya Angelou's powerful poem, although it comes from a place of greater oppression:

Caged Bird 

A free bird leaps
on the back of the wind 
and floats downstream 
till the current ends
and dips his wing
in the orange sun rays
and dares to claim the sky. 

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and 
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing. 

The caged bird sings 
with a fearful trill 
of things unknown 
but longed for still 
and his tune is heard 
on the distant hill 
for the caged bird 
sings of freedom. 

The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn
and he names the sky his own. 

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams 
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream 
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied 
so he opens his throat to sing. 

The caged bird sings 
with a fearful trill 
of things unknown 
but longed for still 
and his tune is heard 
on the distant hill 
for the caged bird 
sings of freedom.