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Crossing

Life And Death
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A passage from life into death or from one spiritual state into another. The term often suggests a journey over a boundary.

Detailed Definition
Crossing is a common poetic metaphor for death as movement across a river, shore, gate, bridge, or threshold. Rather than depicting death only as an ending, it frames dying as passage into an unknown realm. The image may carry fear, serenity, reluctance, or expectation, depending on the poem’s tone. Crossings often draw on mythic journeys, religious beliefs, and the emotional distance between mourners and the departed.
Example
Example in poetry:
In Alfred, Lord Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar," the crossing of a sandbar figures the passage from life into death; A poem may describe a ferry crossing at dusk so that the literal journey suggests a spiritual transition; The line "I crossed from her bedside into the cold street" can make crossing signify the first stage of grief; Repeated images of doors, bridges, rivers, and shorelines can develop crossing as a death-related motif
Additional Notes
Crossing often uses a border image—river, bridge, shore, doorway, or road—to represent death or transformation. Its emotional tone depends on whether the journey seems peaceful, dangerous, chosen, or forced.
Also Known As
Passing Passage Crossing Over Transition Bridge
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