Analysis of Ancestral
Archibald MacLeish 1892 (Glencoe) – 1982 (Boston)
The star dissolved in evening—the one star
The silently
and night O soon now, soon
And still the light now
and still now the large
Relinquishing
and through the pools of blue
Still, still the swallows
and a wind now
and the tree
Gathering darkness:
I was small. I lay
Beside my mother on the grass, and sleep
Came—
slow hooves and dripping with the dark
The velvet muzzles, the white feet that move
In a dream water
and O soon now soon
Sleep and the night.
And I was not afraid.
Her hand lay over mine. Her fingers knew
Darkness,—and sleep—the silent lands, the far
Far off of morning where I should awake.
Scheme | ABCDXXEXDBXXXX XXXCX XEAX |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 0101010011 0100 011111 01011 01101 0100 010111 11010 0011 001 10010 11111 0111010101 1 11010101 0101001111 00110 01111 1001 011101 0111010101 1001010101 1111011101 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 622 |
Words | 117 |
Sentences | 6 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 14, 5, 4 |
Lines Amount | 23 |
Letters per line (avg) | 21 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 159 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 38 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 35 sec read
- 79 Views
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"Ancestral" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/3745/ancestral>.
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