Analysis of You Never Can Tell
Ella Wheeler Wilcox 1855 (Janesville) – 1919
You never can tell when you send a word,
Like an arrow shot from a bow
By an archer blind, be it cruel or kind,
Just where it may chance to go.
It may pierce the breast of your dearest friend,
Tipped with its poison or balm,
To a stranger’s heart in life’s great mart,
It may carry its pain or its calm.
You never can tell when you do an act
Just what the result will be;
But with every deed you are sowing a seed,
Though the harvest you may not see.
Each kindly act is an acorn dropped
In God’s productive soil
You may not know, but the tree shall grow,
With shelter for those who toil.
You never can tell what your thoughts will do,
In bringing you hate or love;
For thoughts are things, and their airy wings
Are swifter than carrier doves.
They follow the law of the universe –
Each thing must create its kind,
And they speed o’er the track to bring you back
Whatever went out from your mind.
Scheme | XXABXCXC XDXDXEBE XXXXXAXA |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1101111101 11101101 11101111011 1111111 1110111101 1111011 101010111 111011111 1101111111 1100111 111001111001 10101111 110111101 010101 111110111 1101111 1101111111 0101111 111101101 11011001 110011010 1110111 0111011111 1011111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 913 |
Words | 180 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 231 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 59 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 20, 2023
- 54 sec read
- 118 Views
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