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Emily DickinsonA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
The heart has symbolically represented love, passion, and sentimentality. From the ancient Egyptian belief in the ib, or the “metaphysical heart,” to the anatomical understanding of the organ by the ancient Greeks and Romans, to the medieval concept of courtly love, humans have always been obsessed with the heart as the seat of emotion. The speaker in Dickinson’s poem specifically identifies hope as “A Patent of the Heart” (Line 2). This implies that hope is a direct derivative of the heart. Because hope comes from this center of passion, it therefore has emotion as its primary source. Hope comes directly from feeling and expression. By relating hope to the heart, the poem indicates the necessity of hope to the human condition.
The act of “invention” refers to bringing ideas or objects together in a new way to create something that previously did not exist. Invention implies the formation of something new using creativity. If hope is an act of invention, then it is an attempt by the person feeling it to bring together all of their desires and aspirations into a single emotion. The individual experiencing the sensation of hope attempts to create something that was not before in existence—motivation towards a desired outcome.
By Emily Dickinson
A Bird, came down the Walk
Emily Dickinson
A Clock stopped—
Emily Dickinson
A narrow Fellow in the Grass (1096)
Emily Dickinson
Because I Could Not Stop for Death
Emily Dickinson
"Faith" is a fine invention
Emily Dickinson
Fame Is a Fickle Food (1702)
Emily Dickinson
"Hope" Is the Thing with Feathers
Emily Dickinson
I Can Wade Grief
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Cleaving in my Mind
Emily Dickinson
I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain
Emily Dickinson
If I Can Stop One Heart from Breaking
Emily Dickinson
If I should die
Emily Dickinson
If you were coming in the fall
Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz — when I died
Emily Dickinson
I'm Nobody! Who Are You?
Emily Dickinson
Much Madness is divinest Sense—
Emily Dickinson
Success Is Counted Sweetest
Emily Dickinson
Tell all the truth but tell it slant
Emily Dickinson
The Only News I Know
Emily Dickinson
There is no Frigate like a Book
Emily Dickinson