Emily Dickinson Meaning

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In the poem “We dream - it is good we are dreaming” (531), Dickinson uses dreams, or the imagination, to prod the mysteries of death. The speaker says, “we are playing”, using repetition and language to show that the players are only dreaming, but they begin to feel paranoid that the performance may truly involve dying; “Lest the Phantasm - prove the mistake." Dickinson equates this dream state with imagination and acting, explaining, "It would hurt us - were we awake -." Dickinson changes the "Phantasm" into "livid Surprise” in the end of the same stanza, as the dream turns into reality, and all that remains of the actors are "Shafts of Granite - / With just an age - and name." The speaker concludes that “It’s prudenter – to dream —” than

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