Dickinson's poem “Publication – is the Auction” deals with the speaker's disdain for the publication of an author's works. The speaker seems to view the act of publishing a work as an act of selling oneself short, compromising one's purity and integrity. In the first line, the speaker conveys the impersonality of the publication by comparing it to an auction, something detached and professional. The speaker goes on to say that the only acceptable reason to publish a work is if the author struggles with poverty and needs to publish to survive. Next, the speaker brings personal experience with her by stating that she would rather become white because she stays in her attic and supposedly writes poems that will never be seen. The speaker also incorporates the concept of a higher being as a creator of thoughts. This higher being then transmits the thoughts to the writer, or “He who brings / Is the corporeal illustration” (10-11). The image of a poem as something that can be bought and sold as a commodity continues throughout the poem. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Many of the words in this poem have more than one meaning and function in multiple ways. The word “publish” is used to mean both commercialization (i.e. publishing books for sale) and releasing something to the public in a non-commercial way. The definition of the word "auction" is also interesting, because it says that the object put up for auction will go to the highest bidder. This definition implies that not only is the object only worth monetary value, but that the monetary value is almost arbitrary. To say that publishing is like an auction is to say that the purpose of publishing is not even to share something, but simply to make as much profit as possible. Many of the other words, such as “package”, “merchant” and “price”, create a very professional and cold image. The poem gives no indication that the speaker is any other than Dickinson herself. The context of the poem is simply a single speaker expressing feelings about writing and publishing. His attitude and the tone of the poem are passionate in an assertive but non-threatening way. She is angry with the whole concept of publishing and what it does to a person. The diction is a few steps above casual speech, but it's not complicated. The ease of diction allows the reader to better understand the meaning of the poem. It is also an example of the poem's message; the diction, just like the author, does not put on airs. The open form of this poem made it more difficult to scan. There is a clear rhyme scheme and some classic poetic devices are present, but these aspects are not quite grouped together in familiar ways. The first stanza is composed of two pairs of rhyming couplets, where the first rhyming couplet is composed of two lines that nearly rhyme with the words "rod" and "man", thus creating an "aabb" rhyme scheme . The remaining three stanzas are quatrains with various rhyme schemes and rhythms. The second verse has a much more obvious rhyme scheme than “cdcd.” In the third stanza, the rhyme scheme is broken, with an “efge” pattern. This variation in the common rhyme scheme is disconcerting to the reader. The last verse has the same rhyme scheme as the second, with the "hihi" scheme. The prevailing foot of the poem is trochaic, with the actual meter varying from verse to verse. The first line of each stanza is clearly trochaic tetrameter. The fact that the beginning of each verse is clearly identifiable provides a stable anchor for the rest of the verses. Some lines have an extra line at the end, which almost allows the reader to transfer the.