Through its unique use of language, Emily Dickinson's poem evokes a feeling of restlessness, and an acute awareness of one's aliveness, morality, and powerlessness in the face of nature. The persona describes the night of the woman's death in a quiet and thoughtful manner, without giving particularly vivid imagery and as such creates a setting that is more psychological than sensory. In fact the poem itself flows like thoughts, with pauses, but without breaks or conclusive cadences. The last stanza exemplifies this characteristic through its employment of dashes (most notably at the end itself) but avoidance of stronger punctuation or conclusive language.
             One of the most immediately apparent characteristics of the poem is its frequent use of capitalization to highlight certain significant words. In general, the words Dickinson has chosen to capitalize relate to the dying woman, the observers, or to the world, as it appears to the observers in this strange time. For example, the first stanza Capitalizes the words "She" and "Dying" (which relate to the woman herself), the word "Us" (which relate to the observers) and the words "Night," "Common Night" and "Nature" (which relate to the perceived environment).
             The element of time is handled in an unusual way within the poem. It seems nearly to stand still, as the speaker implies through the use of the phrase "It was a narrow time--."Its flow is hampered through the use pauses, and through the relative lack of action in the poem. Time may even be seen as a constricting element: (before the woman died it was precious and dwelled upon time too scared to speak or act); after her death its very abundance is oppressive to the observer, who must return to their lives in the solemnity of the aftermath, giving glimpsed their morality and even envied the simplicity of the dying woman's state.
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