Analysis of Birth-Dues
Robinson Jeffers 1887 (Allegheny) – 1962 (Carmel-by-the-Sea)
Joy is a trick in the air; pleasure is merely
contemptible, the dangled
Carrot the ass follows to market or precipice;
But limitary pain -- the rock under the tower
and the hewn coping
That takes thunder at the head of the turret-
Terrible and real. Therefore a mindless dervish
carving himself
With knives will seem to have conquered the world.
The world's God is treacherous and full of
unreason; a torturer, but also
The only foundation and the only fountain.
Who fights him eats his own flesh and perishes
of hunger; who hides in the grave
To escape him is dead; who enters the Indian
Recession to escape him is dead; who falls in
love with the God is washed clean
Of death desired and of death dreaded.
He has joy, but Joy is a trick in the air; and
pleasure, but pleasure is contemptible;
And peace; and is based on solider than pain.
He has broken boundaries a little and that will
estrange him; he is monstrous, but not
To the measure of the God.... But I having told
you--
However I suppose that few in the world have
energy to hear effectively-
Have paid my birth-dues; am quits with the
people.
Submitted by Holt
Scheme | AXBXXXXXX XXCBXCXXX XDXXXXXXAXD X |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Etheree (23%) |
Metre | 110100110110 0100010 1001101101100 1110110010 00110 11101011010 10001101010 1001 1111111001 0111100011 10100110 010010001010 111111101 11011001 1011111100100 010101111110 1101111 1101001110 111111010010 1011010100 010111111 1110100010011 011111011 101010111101 1 10101110011 100110100 111111110 10 01011 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,163 |
Words | 209 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 9, 9, 11, 1 |
Lines Amount | 30 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 221 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 52 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:03 min read
- 43 Views
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