With one master stroke of concision, the word “perches” conveys a world of meaning: lightness, natural greenery (where things typically perch), balance, and strength. The “thing” has feathers, implying lightness and airiness but is it a bird, an angel, or something else entirely?īe it bird or angel, this feathered friend “perches” in the soul, like a small, flying spirit who is a visitor rather than a resident. Undaunted, she sets out to define it by comparing it to a living being. Her choice of the deliberately ambiguous word “thing” in the first line sets our minds to speculating, and emphasizes that since it is essentially indefinable, any comparison to what we know will be inadequate. By placing the word in quotation marks, she acknowledges that it is an intangible abstraction. Dickinson uses an extended metaphor in her attempt to define the complex and elusive concept of Hope. The first stanza, which I know by heart, never fails to cheer me when the world begins to look bleak. “’Hope’” is the thing with feathers,” by Emily Dickinson, is a favorite poem that has been much on my mind lately.
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