Home Burial is about a husband and wife who face the possibility of separation because of grief from the death of their child. The theme of the poem has to do with the way that the husband and wife handle, and express to each other the death of their child. The wife feels that the husband is being way too insensitive about the baby's death. She believes he shows no emotion regarding the deceased child, where as the husband wants to just put the death behind them and move on. He wants his wife to stop running away and share her grief with him, that way they can put the past behind them, and move on with their life together, instead of separating. Their conflicting emotions, and lack of communication regarding their son"s death are a cause for the need of separation.
The poem starts off with Amy, the wife standing on the stairs, looking out the window at her child's grave. She has an expression of fear on her face which she quickly changes to dullness, when she realizes her husband is watching her. Her husband wants to know what she is looking at when she stares out the window. In the poem he implies that he has caught her looking out the window many times, and he can not figure out why "What is it you see from up there always - For I want to know" (p 01). The husband takes his time looking out the window too. He finally realizes what she is staring at but, she does not believe him. This stanza shows that Amy is still mourning for her dead child and she has not put the death behind her, although she believes that her husband has. That is why she changed her facial expression to dullness so that he would not question her about what captivated her about the window. She did not want her husband to realize that she was still hung up on there child's death. When he says she knows what she is looking at she gets defensive about it because she does not think he understands her pain.