Compare And Contrast Dust In The Wind By Emily Dicken

Death Stops for Everyone

Music and poems tend to be more similar than most people realize. That is what I realized when I compared Kerry Levgren’s’ “Dust in the Wind” to Emily Dickens’ “Because I could not stop for Death”. The two works both indulge in the same idea. The idea of death, and that its inevitable. Although they differ slightly in tone and perspective, they both are very similar. The comparing of “Dust in the Wind” and “Because I could not stop for Death” sheds a whole new light on the ideas and meanings. The authors of both these works obviously shared very similar ideas but also differ in their way of expressing their feelings towards the subject that they are both explaining.

In both the poem and the song, the theme is almost exactly the same.

They both speak of accepting death and that is cannot be avoided. The theme is very obvious and not hard to interpret. “Now don’t hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky. It slips

away. And all your money wont another minute buy”(Levgren 14-17). This verse is one of the best because it summarizes the meaning of the song in one verse. This verse resonates strongly with the message in Emily Dickens poem. The message of “Because I could not stop for death / He kindly stopped for me“(Dickens 1-2). Although death tends to make us sad, the writers of both works gives death a more calming approach to the idea of mortality and its eventual occurence.
While the topic and theme of the poems are very similar, the perspective from which the poem and song hold differ greatly. For instance, in the song the speaker is looking at death from a living perspective, while in the poem the speaker is viewing death from a post-dead perspective. The song definitely takes on the role of how we see death more than the poem because we relate to its perspective. In the poem the speaker has died and is heading toward eternity. This is an entirely different concept than how most people think of the afterlife. Although they differ greatly in their perspective they actually directly relate in a certain way also. The living perspective portrayed in “Dust in the Wind” thinks of death in a more saddened tone and is directly related to Emily Dickens thought of death as well. The more depressed feeling that the song expresses is due to the unavailability of knowing what happens after death, much like the poem. It is interesting to see how the two can differ in this way but still find such similar ground.
In Emily Dicken’s poem the tone is not a sad one but rather a curious one.

The tone does not meet our assumed feelings of death, making this poem a unique one. Unlike Emily Dickens poem “Dust in the Wind” takes a more saddening and deep approach to the thought of dying. In the poem, the speaker is already dead and experiencing death throughout its length, while in the song the speaker is alive and pondering life and death. This is an important feature for understanding the tone. In the song, life is compared to dust in the wind. It just blows along, continuing to move unnoticed and unchanging. Comparing life in this way gives the mood a deep saddening feeling toward death and life. This metaphor makes the reader think deeply and often reminisce. This is completely opposite that of the poem’s tone. In the poem the feeling isn’t sad or reminiscent, rather it gives a more curious and calming mood to death. This is a more hopeful way of feeling about death than being “just a drop of water in an endless sea”(Levgren

8).
It is easy to see the correlation between the two works. They use the same topic and theme but express them in different ways. The writers seemed to have a common goal in writing these, and make it clear through out the length of the work. Mortality is unavoidable and relates to everyone because at one point everyone passes away and until that moment no one knows what will happen next. Death relates to all of us, this means these works also relate to all of us. Death is a common thought among humans and the works from Kerry Levgren and Emily Dickens gives us a different way of thinking about it.