How to read -- ?

[Isagel]

What does the symbols -- in a line represent? Is it a long pause? Or something missing?

I´ve seen them quite often in Dickinson´s poetry . (Is that apostrophe right? ;) I´m not sure how to use them. And I really appreciate comments on grammar, without them I will never improve my english)

I´ll leave this poem by Dickinson as an example:

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading--treading--till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through--

And when they all were seated,
A Service, like a Drum--
Kept beating--beating--till I thought
My Mind was going numb--

And then I heard them lift a Box
And creak across my Soul
With those same Boots of Lead, again,
Then Space--began to toll,

As all the Heavens were a Bell,
And Being, but an Ear,
And I, and Silence, some strange Race
Wrecked, solitary, here--

And then a Plank in Reason, broke,
And I dropped down, and down--
And hit a World, at every plunge,
And Finished knowing--then--

[AbdoRinbo]

It symbolizes a break in a sentence. Take this one for example:

'After reading two pages of Ulysses I felt a burning desire----and I'm not kidding----to chuck it against the wall.'

The way Dickinson uses it is a little different. Apparently she uses it to emphasize a certain word, which is less of a tool in grammar and more of a rhetorical device.

Maybe that helps?

[Isagel]

That helps. Thanks.