If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking

Emily Dickinson

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1929

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

Many of Emily Dickinson’s poems are composed in hymnal stanza, or common meter: cross-rhymed quatrains alternating tetrameter and trimeter lines. So many of her poems follow this form that it’s noteworthy when one of her poems does not. The first three lines of “If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking” seem to indicate another poem in hymnal stanza, but the fourth line drops a foot from its predicted trimeter. The next line is also a foot short, followed by a full trimeter line, then the final, repeated second line, is also trimeter. The result is a kind of diminished hymn that trails off before it gets started. It’s as if the speaker notices the halting uncertainty of her meter and ends the poem early with an assuring restatement. But in a poem about the power of a very small gesture, the unfinished lines mean more in absence and suggestion than would further ornamentation.

The rhyme pattern mostly follows an alternating abababb pattern, close to Dickinson’s typical form. The “robin” (Line 5) is a faint echo of the unaccented syllables in “breaking” (Line 2) and “aching” (Line 4); it’s about as far stretched as rhyme can be and still be called a possible rhyme. The early placement of the repeated “I shall not live in vain” in Line 7 makes for an unexpected couplet at the end of the poem. With its repeated line, the poem almost resembles a triolet, though it is one line short and only repeats one line, rather than two.

Diction Choices

While still tactile, Dickinson’s verb choice “cool one pain” (Line 4) is unusual. The more likely verb for alleviating pain would be to “ease” or even to “soothe.” Dickinson’s diction often demonstrates her unrelenting desire for intellectual authenticity; she demanded it of herself and admired it in others. Often unexpected or even jarring word choices in Dickinson’s poems specifically invite the reader to pay close attention to a particular line or image. At times, word choice indicates the speaker’s struggle to find language to accommodate the scale of her thought, in the same way Dickinson’s quintessential dashes slow the speaker’s voice as if to indicate careful pauses while exploring her subjects (though the dashes are not present in “If I Can Stop One Heart”). For Dickinson, using a word in a new but apt way is a kind of discovery, a secret shared with the reader, and a conversion experience in miniature.

Anthropomorphism

Subtle anthropomorphism appears as Dickinson depicts the robin “fainting” (Line 5). It’s not unusual for Dickinson to assign human traits to animals in her poetry; probably the best known are the extended metaphors in “A Narrow Fellow in the Grass” and “A Bird Came Down the Walk.” Birds hold a kind of wisdom and freedom for Dickinson, as in “Split the Lark;” birds represent both an avenue to understanding and a fragile entity to be protected. With her Calvinist upbringing and education, Dickinson would have been taught that through science, nature, and scientific inquiry, the hand of God can be seen. While Dickinson may not have attended church as an adult, she retained her practice of looking for the divine in the natural world. Anthropomorphism would have seemed natural to her, as the lives of all of God’s creatures would have had a value and a role in the world.

Repetition

Not only does this short poem derive some of its structure from a repeated line, but the beginnings of two lines repeat, as well. The conditional phrase “If I can” begins the first and third lines of the poem, highlighting the way the speaker situates the proposition of the poem itself. The repeated “or” beginning Lines 4 and 5 pointedly reminds the reader that only one of these acts is needed, so the conjunction between them is exclusive, rather than a cumulative “and.” The poem’s repeated line, “I shall not live in vain” (Lines 2 and 7), becomes an emphatic refrain in the space of seven lines. Repeating the line creates an incantatory quality for the poem, but also raises the question as to the speaker’s demeanor. She may repeat the line to demand belief from the reader with as much force as these short lines can manage. Or she may repeat the line to steady herself, as a mantra would, so she can live by these words. For a poem composed in a truncated version of hymnal stanza, a refrain fits—even if it only once repeats. This hymn is private, for a congregation of one.