Summary of Day by Emily Dickinson | Class 12 Compulsory English

Summary of Day by Emily Dickinson

The poem "I’ll tell you how the Sun rose" (also known as "A Day") by Emily Dickinson shows a single day through the eyes of a childlike speaker. She describes the sunrise and sunset in a playful and imaginative way.

The speaker talks about a sunrise and a sunset.In the morning, the sun rose slowly. It looked like colorful ribbons unrolling one by one in the sky. Church steeples seemed to float in soft purple light. Happy news spread fast, like squirrels running. The hills took off their cloudy bonnets. Bobolink birds started to sing. After seeing all this, the speaker said softly to herself, "That must have been the sun rising."

In the evening, the speaker says she does not know exactly how the sun set. It looked like there was a purple stile, which is a small set of steps over a fence. Little boys and girls in yellow were climbing over it the whole time. These yellow children stand for the sun’s rays. When they reached the other side, a gentle teacher in gray appeared. The gray teacher stands for twilight. He softly closed the evening bars, like shutting the gates of the day. Then he quietly led the flock away. The flock means sheep that stand for the stars or the end of the day.

Understanding the Text

Answer these questions.

a. How does the poet describe the morning sun in the first stanza?

The sun rises slowly. Its rays are like colorful ribbons appearing one at a time in the sky.

b. What does the line ‘The news like squirrels ran’ mean?

The line means that the happy news of the new day spreads quickly and excitedly, just like squirrels running around.

c. What do you understand by the line ‘The hills untied their bonnets’?

The hills seem to remove their cloudy covers. The clouds lift like ladies taking off their hats.

d. Is the speaker watching the morning sun? Why? Why not?

No, she is not watching it directly. She notices the changes around her and only then softly realizes that it was the sun rising.

e. How does the sun set?

The speaker says she does not know exactly how the sun sets. She imagines yellow sun rays as children climbing over a purple fence. Then a gentle gray figure (twilight) closes the day’s gates and quietly leads the flock away.