Analysis of Delilah
Ella Wheeler Wilcox 1855 (Janesville) – 1919
In the midnight of darkness and terror,
When I would grope nearer to God,
With my back to a record of error
And the highway of sin I have trod,
There comes to me shapes I would banish –
The shapes of the deeds I have done;
And I pray and I plead till they vanish –
All vanish and leave me, save one.
That one, with a smile like the splendour
Of the sun in the middle-day skies –
That one, with a spell that is tender –
That one with a dream in her eyes –
Cometh close, in her rare southern beauty,
Her languor, her indolent grace;
And my soul turns its back on its duty
To live in the light of her face.
She touches my cheek, and I quiver –
I tremble with exquisite pains;
She sighs – like an overcharged river
My blood rushes on through my veins;
She smiles – and in mad-tiger fashion,
As a she-tiger fondles her own,
I clasp her with fierceness and passion,
And kiss her with shudder and groan.
Once more, in our love’s sweet beginning,
I put away God and the World;
Once more, in the joys of our sinnings,
Are the hopes of eternity hurled.
There is nothing my soul lacks or misses
As I clasp the dream-shape to my breast;
In the passion and pain of her kisses
Life blooms to its richest and best.
O ghost of dead sin unrelenting,
Go back to the dust, and the sod!
Too dear and too sweet for repenting,
Ye stand between me and my God.
If I, by the Throne, should behold you,
Smiling up with those eyes loved so well,
Close, close in my arms I would fold you,
And dropp with you down to sweet Hell!
Scheme | ABABCDCD AEAEFGFG AHAHDIDI JKEKLMLM JBJBNONO |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Etheree (23%) Tetractys (20%) |
Metre | 001110010 11111011 1111001110 00111111 111111110 01101111 0110111110 11001111 11101101 101001011 111011110 11101001 1010011010 0101001 0111111110 11001101 110110110 11011001 111110110 11101111 110011010 10110101 11011010 01011001 1101011010 11011001 110011101 101101001 1110111110 111011111 0010011010 11111001 11111010 11101001 110111010 11011011 111011011 101111111 110111111 01111111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,527 |
Words | 303 |
Sentences | 9 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 40 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 229 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 60 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:30 min read
- 89 Views
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"Delilah" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/10585/delilah>.
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