"I dwell in possibility"

Emily Dickinson’s “I dwell in possibility” is a poem about living in a dream rather than in the “narrow” confines of life. Dickinson’s use of not only words but also dashes helps to convey the idea of living in both worlds, dreamlike and full of “possibility” and everyday “prose.”

The only punctuation in the poem is by dashes, which seem to take the place of normal commas and periods. The dashes do more than punctuate, however, and they often add stress to ideas, either words or phrases, that Dickinson has intentionally isolated from her statements. Dickinson starts the poem stating, “I dwell in possibility—A fairer House than Prose.” The dashes create a distinction and separate her dream life from her everyday life and home. There “superior[ity]” of windows allows the dream life on the outside to be seen through them, bridging the gap between the two worlds. The “Chambers as the Cedars--/Impregnable of Eye” serve to separate the two worlds of possibility and prose; the walls of cedar are firm and cannot be seen through. In the next line, however, the “Everlasting Roof” suggests that the dream life and the world of possibility continue through the real roof and instead is limited only by the sky.  

In the last stanza of the poem, Dickinson is living completely in “possibility”. Though she occupies a space of “prose”, it is her work and “Occupation” to live in the poetry and possibility she creates for herself. Though her real, everyday space and scope may be “narrow” her realm of possibility allow her to “spread wide [her] narrow Hands/ To gather Paradise-.”