The soul is the home for hope. It can also be seen as a metaphor. Hope rests in our soul the way a bird rests on its perch. In the third and fourth stanzas, And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all. Dickinson uses the imagery of a bird s continuous song to represent eternal hope.
Birds never stop singing their song of hope.
The fifth stanza And sweetest in the gale is heard describes the bird s song of hope as sweetest in the wind. It conjures up images of a bird s song of hope whistling above the sound of gale force winds and offering the promise that soon the storm will end. Dickinson uses the next three lines to metaphorically describe what a person who destroys hope feels like. And sore must be the storm That could abash the little bird That kept so many warm. A person who destroys hope with a storm of anger and negativity feels the pain they cause in others.