After Great Pain

This poem describes the experience of a person who has suffered severely. The speaker does not identify the motif or the reason of the suffering; it could be the death of a friend or losing a relationship. The writer mainly focus on magnifying the effect such suffering has on the human body and mind.

"After great pain, a formal feeling comes / The nerves sit ceremoniously like tombs," the speaker claims that the nerves are the first part of the body to register the pain. The nerves become stiff and empty and cold. The nerves experience a "formal feeling" because they are not relaxed but feel stiff like formal clothing or events. "Ceremoniously like tombs" further details the formality along with the cold hardness of a place where dead bodies are stored.

"The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore, / And Yesterday, or Centuries before?" show that time no longer seems clear. The pain has made the passage of time stand still or speed up. The speaker is unsure about when she first experienced the pain; it could have happened "yesterday" or hundreds of years ago.

"The feet mechanical go round / Of Ground or Air or Ought." The writer claims that when a person is happy or functioning with normal emotions, life seems to flow and events seem to move easily from one to another; life is flexible, not mechanical. But when a person is tragically unhappy, one's will is stifled, making it difficult to carry on daily routines.