News at Eleven: But Emily Dickinson seems rather tame

because she pretty much uses the same meter every time. It's called 'common meter.' It's a line of four beats that's followed by a line of three beats. So a typical one would be: 'Because I could not stop for Death/He kindly stopped for me.' And there's actually a kind of pause at the end of the first line, a sort of silent fifth beat. This is the meter of a lot of ballads. It's the meter of Protestant hymns, "Amazing grace! how sweet the sound,/that saved a wretch like me." It's the rhythm of many nursery rhymes, "Old King Cole was a merry old soul/And a merry old soul was he." So you have a very conventional cadence in most of these poems. It's widely known that almost every one of her poems can be sung whether you like it or not, to the tune of 'A Yellow Rose From Texas.'

from NPR: Billy Collins: A Poet's Affection For Emily Dickinson
also NPR: Billy Collins: A Poet's Affection For Emily Dickinson (audio)

~~~~~~~~~~~