Analysis of Song. Sorrow
Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792 (Horsham) – 1822 (Lerici)
To me this world's a dreary blank,
All hopes in life are gone and fled,
My high strung energies are sank,
And all my blissful hopes lie dead.--
The world once smiling to my view,
Showed scenes of endless bliss and joy;
The world I then but little knew,
Ah! little knew how pleasures cloy;
All then was jocund, all was gay,
No thought beyond the present hour,
I danced in pleasure’s fading ray,
Fading alas! as drooping flower.
Nor do the heedless in the throng,
One thought beyond the morrow give,
They court the feast, the dance, the song,
Nor think how short their time to live.
The heart that bears deep sorrow’s trace,
What earthly comfort can console,
It drags a dull and lengthened pace,
'Till friendly death its woes enroll.--
The sunken cheek, the humid eyes,
E’en better than the tongue can tell;
In whose sad breast deep sorrow lies,
Where memory's rankling traces dwell.--
The rising tear, the stifled sigh,
A mind but ill at ease display,
Like blackening clouds in stormy sky,
Where fiercely vivid lightnings play.
Thus when souls' energy is dead,
When sorrow dims each earthly view,
When every fairy hope is fled,
We bid ungrateful world adieu.
Scheme | ABAB CDCD EFEF GXGX HIHI JKJK LELE BCBC |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain (88%) |
Metre | 11110101 11011101 11110011 01110111 01110111 11110101 01111101 11011101 1111111 110101010 11010101 100111010 1101001 11010101 11010101 11111111 01111101 11010110 11010101 11011101 01010101 11010111 01111101 1110101 01010101 01111101 110010101 11010101 11110011 11011101 110010111 11010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,157 |
Words | 212 |
Sentences | 11 |
Stanzas | 8 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 32 |
Letters per line (avg) | 28 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 113 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 26 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 25, 2023
- 1:04 min read
- 174 Views
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