Emily Dickinson’s “The morns are meeker than they were”

Emily Dickinson’s “The morns are meeker than they were”

Emily Dickinson’s “The morns are meeker than they were” is one of the poet’s riddle poems; it is focusing on the phenomenon of how mornings change with the season.

Introduction with Text of  “The morns are meeker than they were”

Emily Dickinson’s speaker in “The morns are meeker than they were” is observing the natural features surrounding her.  She has begun to detect a transformation in how morning is now behaving.

She then remarks about the behavior of the trees and eventually focuses a comment on the “field.” Finally, she reveals how all these alterations will influence her own behavior.

This poem presents itself as one of Emily Dickinson’s riddles, in which she describes the subject but does not name it;  thus she allows her audience to figure out the answer to the riddle.

The morns are meeker than they were –

The morns are meeker than they were –
The nuts are getting brown –
The berry’s cheek is plumper –
The Rose is out of town.

The Maple wears a gayer scarf –
The field a scarlet gown –
Lest I should be old fashioned
I’ll put a trinket on.

Reading of “The morns are meeker than they were” 

Commentary on “The morns are meeker than they were”

Mornings change with the season.

First Stanza:  The Rose Has Flown

The morns are meeker than they were –
The nuts are getting brown –
The berry’s cheek is plumper –
The Rose is out of town.

The  speaker observes that mornings have become more sedate and quiet than they had been.  At this point, readers/listeners have no idea why the behavior of morning should have become “meeker.”

The second line, however, begins to open up the answer to a riddle, as she begins to drop hints about her subject.   She describes the browning of the nuts, and the plumping of the “cheek” of the berry.

And by the final line, which reports that the roses have gone away, no longer decorating the summer day, the reader can be sure that the speaker is describing the onset of the autumn season, a season Dickinson loved and found unusually inspiring for her poetic musings.

Second Stanza:  A Trinket for the New Fashion

The Maple wears a gayer scarf –
The field a scarlet gown –
Lest I should be old fashioned
I’ll put a trinket on.

The speaker now offers further clues about her subject.  Maple trees are now decked out in leaves that look more varied and that seem more merry than the simple summer green they had hitherto adorned.  Even the meadow now dons a colorful dress. Replacing its summer green attire is a bold “scarlet gown.”

After reporting on all the changes the speaker has observed in the behavior of morning, the coloring of the nuts, the fattening of the berries, the absence of the roses, the maple leaves turning all colorful.

And the meadow is sporting a bright red dress. The speaker now announces that she will begin wearing some “trinket,” in order to keep up with all the modern day apparel.  

She does not want to be caught dressed for summer and appear “old fashioned” among the newly minted, colorful styles being sported by the beings that constitute her “society” of creatures during this new and exciting season.