Analysis of Wild Geese Across the Moon

Muriel Stuart 1885 – 1967



REEDS, snake-like, coiled in the mist
Where the low fog drives:
The muddy cough of the stream that strives
To free its throat from the clot of reed,
As they fight it out the water and the weed--
While the fog, above, takes turn and twist:
Men, these are your lives!

Wild Geese across the moon:
As some hand that unrolls
And scratches black names upon blood-red scrolls;
So seem these shadows, dipping, dying,
Black shapes on the red moon, screaming, flying,
Till the fog blots out, or late or soon:
Men, these are your souls!


Scheme ABBCCAX DBEFFDE
Poetic Form
Metre 1111001 10111 010110111 111110111 11111010001 101011101 11111 110101 11111 0101101111 11111010 1110111010 101111111 11111
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 532
Words 98
Sentences 3
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 7, 7
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 29
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 203
Words per stanza (avg) 48
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

29 sec read
56

Muriel Stuart

Muriel Stuart was The daughter of a Scottish barrister was a poet particularly concerned with the topic of sexual politics though she first wrote poems about World War I She later gave up poetry writing her last work was published in the 1930s She was born Muriel Stuart Irwin She was hailed by Hugh MacDiarmid as the best woman poet of the Scottish Renaissance although she was not Scottish but English Despite this his comment led to her inclusion in many Scottish anthologies Thomas Hardy described her poetry as Superlatively good Her most famous poem In the Orchard is entirely dialogs and in no kind of verse form which makes it innovative for its time She does use rhyme a mixture of half-rhyme and rhyming couplets abab form Other famous poems of hers are The Seed Shop The Fools and Man and his Makers Muriel also wrote a gardening book called Gardeners Nightcap 1938 which was later reprinted by Persephone Books more…

All Muriel Stuart poems | Muriel Stuart Books

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