Journal # 41: Emily Dickinson poem "I stepped from plank to plank"

The poem that I chose to read was "I stepped from plank to plank." Line one, "I stepped from plank to plank" (Dickinson), which is also the title of the poem, seems to be, at face value, just walking on planks. What comes to mind is someone carefully stepping around, trying to avoid touching the ground, or falling through. It could be that the person walking is very careful, and wants to take their time, least they fall through. "So slow and cautiously"(Dickinson), the second line seems to reinforce this idea. If they fail to be cautious, perhaps death could await them, or some other fate.
"The stars about my head I felt, about my feet the sea"(Dickinson), follows. It brings to mind a peaceful night on the ocean, but it could also be danger. Night is the setting for many horror movies, and in the water one could easily drown. "I knew not but the next would be my final inch" (Dickinson) seems to be writing about the dangers that face her. This poem is a metaphor for life. Someone can't know when they are going to die, or what life has in store for them. "This gave me that precarious gait some call experience" (Dickinson) is like the end of her life. She knows that only at the end of life, she knows that only at the end of life are you able to know enough to be confident in life. She describes it as a "precarious" gait. This could mean that she isn't choosing to be walk with a gait, but it just happens because of experience. Someone who has experience knows that they have lived life most of the way through. Experience really only comes with age. She, in her old age, has become experienced by living through life. She is writing how, no matter how careful you are, or how ever far in life you get; we all die. It's kind of like a "dust in the wind" thing. Even though life is a beautiful thing to live through, eventually you will fall into the ocean, no matter how experienced.

Dickinson. "The Poetry of Emily Dickinson. Complete Poems of 1924. Bartleby.com." Bartleby.com: Great Books Online -- Quotes, Poems, Novels, Classics and Hundreds More. Web. 22 Mar. 2011. .