Analysis of Ode to the West Wind
Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792 (Horsham) – 1822 (Lerici)
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn's being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
Her clarion o'er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odors plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh, hear!
Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean,
Angels of rain and lightning: there are spread
On the blue surface of thine aery surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head
Of some fierce Maenad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge
Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might
Of vapors, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst: oh, hear!
Thou who didst waken from his summer dreams
The blue Mediterranean, where he lay,
Lulled by the coil of his crystalline streams,
Beside a pumice isle in Baiae's bay,
And saw in sleep old palaces and towers
Quivering within the wave's intenser day,
All overgrown with azure moss and flowers
So sweet, the sense faints picturing them! Thou
For whose path the Atlantic's level powers
Cleave themselves into chasms, while far below
The sea-blooms and the oozy woods which wear
The sapless foliage of the ocean, know
Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with fear,
And tremble and despoil themselves: oh, hear!
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be
The comrade of thy wanderings over Heaven,
As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed
Scarce seemed a vision; I would ne'er have striven
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.
Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
Will take from both a deep, autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! Be thou me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!
And, by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
Scheme | ABA BCB DED EFE FG HBH BIB IJI JFJ KG LML MNM NCN DFD KG FOF OXO HPH PQP QQ XRX RXH STS XUT UU |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Tetractys (20%) |
Metre | 11111111010 1110110011 110111101010 1001010101 100101011 11111101 011111101 1101011101 1101010111 010010010101 1011111101 1101010101 110111010 0100010111 11111011010 1111010111 110101110010 1011010111 101101111 1011100101 1111101011 1001010101 0110010111 10101111101 11011011 101111001 110111010 11010011111 1111011101 0100100111 110111101 010101011 01011100010 100010111 1011101010 1101110011 11100101010 1010111101 011001111 011010101 1101001111 010010111 110011111 1100111111 01110111001 0101111011 1110100110 101011011 01111001010 111101111 11010111110 1111010111 1111010101 1101011111 01011101101 111110101 11111010101 1111110111 0101110100 1111010101 1101011101 1101110101 111110010 1101110011 0100110111 1011111 1001110111 1111111 0101010011 1101111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 2,998 |
Words | 554 |
Sentences | 20 |
Stanzas | 25 |
Stanza Lengths | 3, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 3, 2 |
Lines Amount | 70 |
Letters per line (avg) | 34 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 96 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 22 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 02, 2023
- 2:49 min read
- 414 Views
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