Stanza 4 Summary

Line 10

How she stood up

• Not to Shmoop out too much on you guys, but we love this line so much for how deceptively simple it is, while still doing a bunch of different things at once. 
• On the surface, this line is really no big deal. She literally stood up. People do that hundreds of times a day. Who cares, right? 
• Wrong. Look closer: Rosa Parks is famous because she did not stand up. She's famous for refusing to stand up. So this line is calling attention to the opposite of what we all know Parks for. 
• But if you think about it (and we do encourage you to think, Shmoopers) Rosa Parks did take a (figurative) stand.
• While we're pretty certain Dove means that Parks literally stood up, this line also works to show how she stood up for her rights. 
• Does this line give you déjà vu? Dove opens the poem with, "How she sat there," and now she's wrapping it up with the very similar, "How she stood up." Dove is keeping up the observational tone that she started out with. In the first line Dove shows us what we know already from history: Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat. At the close, she's showing us how Parks stood up for herself—and all African-Americans.

Lines 11–12

when they bent down to retrieve
her purse. That courtesy.

• It looks like Dove is taking a little snapshot of Parks: someone is picking up her purse for her and she stands up while they're doing it. 
• Who the "they" is in line 11 is not entirely clear. Dove has kept the scene of the poem pretty vague. We have the historical background of what Parks is famous for, but what's happening from moment to moment in this poem is up for interpretation. In all likelihood, the "they" is a gentleman or gentlemen—we say that because it was customary at the time for men to open doors for ladies, take off their coats, etc. (chivalry was not dead in 1955). But exactly who these gentlemen were is unclear. Maybe these were police officers coming to arrest her, but being respectful enough to pick up her purse from the ground? Photographers? Supporters? Black men? White men? We can only guess. 
• The second part of line 12 is equally as ambiguous. Who is being courteous? Is it Parks, because she stands up while these gentlemen are picking up her purse and she stands as a way to acknowledge the polite act? Or is it the gentlemen, being courteous by retrieving the purse in the first place? Maybe it's both.
• Frankly, it really doesn't matter. We don't know, and we won't. What Dove is doing in the final stanza is showing human dignity. Parks refused to give up her seat to a white person on the bus because it threatened her human dignity. That policy, and others like it, was put in place because certain white people felt they were superior to black people, and that was an affront to every African-American's dignity. 
• In the final line, Dove uses assonance, or the repetition of a vowel sound (in this case the "er" sound in "purse" and "courtesy") to end this poem on a musically soft, but strong, note. 
• The subtle picture that Dove paints of Rosa Parks is one of a humble but dignified woman. That quiet strength is what shines through in this poem. And that's worthy of a standing (or sitting?) ovation.