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Primary Source Sets
The Poetry of Emily Dickinson
The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “I felt a funeral in my brain,” ca. 1861.

The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “I felt a funeral in my brain,” ca. 1861.

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,

And Mourners to and fro

Kept treading - treading - till

it seemed

That Sense was breaking through -

And when they all were seated,

A Service, like a Drum -

Kept beating - beating - till

I thought

My mind was going numb -

And then I heard them

lift a Box

And creak across my Brain my

Soul

With those same Boots of

Lead, again,

Then Space - began to toll,

As all the Heavens were

a Bell,

And Being, but an Ear,

And I, and Silence, some

strange Race

Wrecked, solitary, here -

And then a Plank in

Reason, broke,

And I dropped down, and

down -

And hit a World, at every

Crash - plunge,

And Got through - Finished knowing - then -

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Citation Information
Dickinson, Emily, “I felt a funeral in my brain,” Digital Public Library of America, https://dp.la/item/caac4558c85641374e528950181f32ed.
Note: These citations are programmatically generated and may be incomplete.
Courtesy of Emily Dickinson Archive via Harvard Library.

Tips for Students

For this source, consider:

  • the author's point of view
  • the author's purpose
  • historical context
  • audience

Item 3 of 10 in the Primary Source Set The Poetry of Emily Dickinson

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An undated image of the Dickinson children: Emily, Austin, and Lavinia.
The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “‘Hope’ is the thing with feathers,” ca. 1861.
The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “I felt a funeral in my brain,” ca. 1861.
The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “No prisoner be,” ca. 1863, which appears at the bottom of the page.
The manuscript of Dickinson’s poem beginning “A narrow fellow in the grass,” ca. 1865.
A map of Amherst, Massachusetts, attributed to Charles B. Adams and Alonzo Gray, published by Pendleton’s Lithography in 1833.
An excerpt from an undated letter from Emily Dickinson to her younger sister, Lavinia.
An undated letter from Emily Dickinson to Thomas Wentworth Higginson, ca. 1880.
An excerpt from Introduction to Emily Dickinson by Henry W. Wells, 1959.
A page from an 1857 Godey’s Lady’s Book, a popular and influential magazine for women during Emily Dickinson’s lifetime.

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