Analysis of As One Who Having Wandered All Night Long
Robert Louis Stevenson 1850 (Edinburgh) – 1894 (Vailima, Samoa)
AS one who having wandered all night long
In a perplexed forest, comes at length
In the first hours, about the matin song,
And when the sun uprises in his strength,
To the fringed margin of the wood, and sees,
Gazing afar before him, many a mile
Of falling country, many fields and trees,
And cities and bright streams and far-off Ocean's smile:
I, O Melampus, halting, stand at gaze:
I, liberated, look abroad on life,
Love, and distress, and dusty travelling ways,
The steersman's helm, the surgeon's helpful knife,
On the lone ploughman's earth-upturning share,
The revelry of cities and the sound
Of seas, and mountain-tops aloof in air,
And of the circling earth the unsupported round:
I, looking, wonder: I, intent, adore;
And, O Melampus, reaching forth my hands
In adoration, cry aloud and soar
In spirit, high above the supine lands
And the low caves of mortal things, and flee
To the last fields of the universe untrod,
Where is no man, nor any earth, nor sea,
And the contented soul is all alone with God.
Scheme | ABABCDCD EFEFGHGH IJIJKHKX |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111010111 000110111 0011001011 01011011 1011010101 10010111001 1101010101 010011011101 11110111 110010111 10010101001 011010101 1011111 0100110001 1101010101 0101001000101 1101010101 01110111 001010101 0101010011 0011110101 101110101 1111110111 000101110111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,001 |
Words | 181 |
Sentences | 2 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 33 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 263 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 60 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 55 sec read
- 115 Views
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"As One Who Having Wandered All Night Long" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/31548/as-one-who-having-wandered-all-night-long>.
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