Analysis of Flower-Life
Henry Timrod 1828 (Charleston) – 1867 (Columbia)
I think that, next to your sweet eyes,
And pleasant books, and starry skies,
I love the world of flowers;
Less for their beauty of a day,
Than for the tender things they say,
And for a creed I've held alway,
That they are sentient powers.
It may be matter for a smile --
And I laugh secretly the while
I speak the fancy out --
But that they love, and that they woo,
And that they often marry too,
And do as noisier creatures do,
I've not the faintest doubt.
And so, I cannot deem it right
To take them from the glad sunlight,
As I have sometimes dared;
Though not without an anxious sigh
Lest this should break some gentle tie,
Some covenant of friendship, I
Had better far have spared.
And when, in wild or thoughtless hours,
My hand hath crushed the tiniest flowers,
I ne'er could shut from sight
The corpses of the tender things,
With other drear imaginings,
And little angel-flowers with wings
Would haunt me through the night.
Oh! say you, friend, the creed is fraught
With sad, and even with painful thought,
Nor could you bear to know
That such capacities belong
To creatures helpless against wrong,
At once too weak to fly the strong
Or front the feeblest foe?
So be it always, then, with you;
So be it -- whether false or true --
I press my faith on none;
If other fancies please you more,
The flowers shall blossom as before,
Dear as the Sibyl-leaves of yore,
But senseless, every one.
Yet, though I give you no reply,
It were not hard to justify
My creed to partial ears;
But, conscious of the cruel part,
My rhymes would flow with faltering art,
I could not plead against your heart,
Nor reason with your tears.
Scheme | AABCCDB EEFDGGF HHIJJJI BBHKAKH LLMNNNM GGOPPPO JJXQQQX |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11111111 01010101 1101110 11110101 11010111 0101111 111110 11110101 01110001 110101 11110111 01110101 011100101 110101 01110111 1111011 111011 11011101 11111101 11001101 110111 010111010 1111010010 111111 01010101 11011 010101011 111101 11110111 110101101 111111 11010001 11010011 11111101 11011 1111111 11110111 111111 11010111 010110101 11010111 1101001 11111101 1011110 111101 11010101 111111001 11110111 110111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,611 |
Words | 306 |
Sentences | 9 |
Stanzas | 7 |
Stanza Lengths | 7, 7, 7, 7, 7, 7, 7 |
Lines Amount | 49 |
Letters per line (avg) | 26 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 180 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 43 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:32 min read
- 76 Views
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"Flower-Life" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/18228/flower-life>.
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