Paragraph of Analysis of "One dignity delays for all"

Thesis: This poem takes a cynical tone towards the general populace because they value the dead more than the living.

Dickinson focuses her poem on a funeral, ironically the area that she feels people center their attention too much on. She spends two stanzas presenting this image, from the "coach [...] and footmen" (5) to the "dignified Attendants" (9). In doing so, she illustrates for the reader how much people value the dead, and how much time they spend on a mere corpse. By contrast, Dickinson does not mention the living being that the corpse once was, just as those who might see a funeral procession passing by and feel pity for the corpse would not consider the same person worthy of thought if they happened to pass on the street. Dickinson illustrates by her focus how people have internalized these relative importances to be considered normal, despite the ridiculousness of valuing a body over a living person.