Analysis of The Poet in the Nursery
Robert Graves 1895 (Wimbledon) – 1985 (Deià)
The youngest poet down the shelves was fumbling
In a dim library, just behind the chair
From which the ancient poet was mum-mumbling
A song about some Lovers at a Fair,
Pulling his long white beard and gently grumbling
That rhymes were beastly things and never there.
And as I groped, the whole time I was thinking
About the tragic poem I’d been writing,...
An old man’s life of beer and whisky drinking,
His years of kidnapping and wicked fighting;
And how at last, into a fever sinking,
Remorsefully he died, his bedclothes biting.
But suddenly I saw the bright green cover
Of a thin pretty book right down below;
I snatched it up and turned the pages over,
To find it full of poetry, and so
Put it down my neck with quick hands like a lover,
And turned to watch if the old man saw it go.
The book was full of funny muddling mazes,
Each rounded off into a lovely song,
And most extraordinary and monstrous phrases
Knotted with rhymes like a slave-driver’s thong.
And metre twisting like a chain of daisies
With great big splendid words a sentence long.
I took the book to bed with me and gloated,
Learning the lines that seemed to sound most grand;
So soon the pretty emerald green was coated
With jam and greasy marks from my hot hand,
While round the nursery for long months there floated
Wonderful words no one could understand.
Scheme | ABABAB AAAAAA CDCDCD XEXEXE XFGFGF |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Tetractys (20%) |
Metre | 010101011100 0011010101 110101011100 0101110101 101111010100 110110101 01110111110 01010101110 11111101010 1111001010 01110101010 1111110 11001101110 1011011101 11110101010 1111110001 111111111010 01111011111 011111010010 1101010101 01010001010 1011101101 01010101110 1111010101 11011111010 1001111111 11010101110 1101011111 110100111110 100111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,343 |
Words | 246 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 |
Lines Amount | 30 |
Letters per line (avg) | 35 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 212 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 49 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 24, 2023
- 1:13 min read
- 68 Views
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