Analysis of The Pity of It
Katharine Lee Bates 1859 (Falmouth) – 1929 (Wellesley)
I. In South Africa
Over the lonesome African plain
The stars look down, like eyes of the slain.
A bumping ride across gullies and ruts,
Now a grumble and now a jest,
A bit of profanity jolted out,
--Whist!
Into a hornet's nest!
Curse on the scout!
Long-bearded Boers rising out of the rocks,
Rocks that already are crimson-splashed,
Ping-ping of bullets, stabbings and cuts,
As if hell hurtled and hissed,
--Then, muffling the shocks,
A sting in the breast,
A mist,
A woman's face down the darkness flashed,
Rest.
All as before, save for still forms spread
Under the boulders dripping red.
Over the lonesome African plain
The stars look down, like eyes of the slain.
II. In the Philippines
Silvery rice-fields whisper wide
How for home and freedom their owners died.
We've set the torch to their bamboo town,
And out they come in a scampering rush,
Little brown men with spears.
Shoot!
Down they go in a crush,
Sickening smears,
Hideous writhing huddles and heaps
Under the palms and the mango-trees.
More, still more! Shoot 'em down
Like brown jack-rabbits that scoot
With comical leaps
Out of the brush.
No loot?
No prisoners, then. As for these --
Hush!
The flag that dreamed of delivering
Shudders and droops like a broken wing.
Silvery rice-felds whisper wide
How for home and freedom their owners died.
Scheme | x AA bcdccdefbgecgfc hh AA x iI jklmklnojmnkmok pp iI |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 101100 100101001 011111101 0101011001 10100101 0110100101 1 010101 1101 1101101101 110101101 111101001 111101 11001 01001 01 010110101 1 110111111 10010101 100101001 011111101 10010 10011101 1110101101 110111011 0111001001 101111 1 111001 1001 100101001 100100101 111111 1111011 11001 1101 11 11001111 1 011110100 100110101 10011101 1110101101 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 1,313 |
Words | 229 |
Sentences | 21 |
Stanzas | 10 |
Stanza Lengths | 1, 2, 15, 2, 2, 1, 2, 15, 2, 2 |
Lines Amount | 44 |
Letters per line (avg) | 23 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 102 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 23 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:09 min read
- 24 Views
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"The Pity of It" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/24911/the-pity-of-it>.
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