Analysis of The Poet And The Bird
Elizabeth Barrett Browning 1806 (Kelloe) – 1861 (Florence)
Said a people to a poet---' Go out from among us straightway!
While we are thinking earthly things, thou singest of divine.
There's a little fair brown nightingale, who, sitting in the gateways
Makes fitter music to our ears than any song of thine!'
The poet went out weeping---the nightingale ceased chanting;
'Now, wherefore, O thou nightingale, is all thy sweetness done?'
I cannot sing my earthly things, the heavenly poet wanting,
Whose highest harmony includes the lowest under sun.'
The poet went out weeping,---and died abroad, bereft there---
The bird flew to his grave and died, amid a thousand wails:---
And, when I last came by the place, I swear the music left there
Was only of the poet's song, and not the nightingale's.
Scheme | XABA CDCD EXEB |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain |
Metre | 101010101110111 1111010111101 101011100110001 110101101110111 01011100100110 1111100111101 1101110101001010 11010001010101 01011100101011 01111101010101 011111011101011 110101010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic octameter |
Characters | 762 |
Words | 132 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 12 |
Letters per line (avg) | 47 |
Words per line (avg) | 10 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 189 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 42 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 27, 2023
- 39 sec read
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