Sweet Safe Houses
poem 457
Sweet Safe Houses - meaning Summary
Privilege Shields Mortality
Dickinson depicts wealthy, well-appointed homes as ‘‘sweet safe houses’’ that seem sealed against suffering and death. The poem contrasts luxurious images—silk, plush, muffled coaches—with the human realities they try to exclude: illness, anguish, and mortality. It suggests both the illusion of protection wealth provides and the social awkwardness around death when it intrudes upon comfort. The tone is quietly ironic, exposing social denial rather than celebrating security.
Read Complete AnalysesSweet safe Houses Glad gay Houses Sealed so stately tight Lids of Steel on Lids of Marble Locking Bare feet out Brooks of Plush in Banks of Satin Not so softly fall As the laughter and the whisper From their People Pearl No Bald Death affront their Parlors No Bold Sickness come To deface their Stately Treasures Anguish and the Tomb Hum by in Muffled Coaches Lest they wonder Why Any for the Press of Smiling Interrupt to die
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