Written from deep depression, this poem describes sadness as something physical. The speaker's heart is pulled down, her thoughts are iron chains, and even the smallest movement feels like holding up the whole earth. The title, "My Bed Is My Coffin," suggests a person who feels so drained that rest has turned into a kind of burial.
Midway through, the speaker steps back and talks about a "happy little girl" who is now only a shell. She has gone through "different levels of hell," and finds that what she was looking for was hers all along. The poem doesn't say what that is, which leaves the line open and a little bittersweet. The images that follow, a painting drying up and summer leaves shriveling and being crushed, show beauty and life being lost. The ending is quieter. Anger comes like a wave, and the speaker asks for "a board to float on," if only the universe would allow it. The mood is exhausted and bleak, but that last small wish for something to hold onto keeps a thread of hope alive.