Personal frustration in Emily Dickinson's poems

Although part of a prominent family with strong ties to its community, Dickinson lived much of her life highly introverted. Considered an eccentric by locals, she developed a noted penchant for white clothing and became known for her reluctance to greet guests or, later in life, to even leave her bedroom. Dickinson never married, and most friendships between her and others depended entirely upon letters. Many of her poems deal with her personal frustrations and sufferings – such as loss of her family members and friends, failure to publish poems, less involvement in society, suffering etc.

Emily Dickinson's many poems deal with the some of the many deaths that plagued her throughout childhood and on into adulthood. Emily lost a lot of very important people to her at a young age, which would be traumatic for any child. These personal losses gave impact on her works throughout her life. For an example, her poem “I never lost as much but twice closely” has been written after two fundamental losses (death of Leonard Humphrey and Benjamin Newton) in her life and it presents an anti-puritan attitude towards God. Here she is expressing the loss of their death. “Twice” and “sod” signifies the death of two people:

“I never lost as much but twice,/
And that was in the sod ;/
Twice have I stood a beggar/
Before the door of God !”

While Dickinson was a prolific private poet, fewer than a dozen of her nearly 1,800 poems were published during her lifetime. The work that was published during her lifetime was usually altered significantly by the publishers to fit the conventional poetic rules of the time. Although during her lifetime her poems were not published, there was something to be gained in own failure to publish her poetry, and that is what she explores in the poem "Success is counted sweetest". It is only those who fail, or who lack something, that can truly appreciate how wonderful it would be if they did succeed:

“Success is counted sweetest/
By those who ne'er succeed./
To comprehend a nectar/
Requires sorest need.”

Nevertheless, it is more precisely evaluated or counted by those who have never succeeded as they can apprehend its true value. In her another poem, “I Had Been Hungry, All the Years”, Emily Dickinson writes that “Hunger-was a way / Of Persons outside Windows- / The Entering-takes away-“.