Analysis of Sparkles From The Wheel
Walt Whitman 1819 (West Hills) – 1892 (Camden)
WHERE the city's ceaseless crowd moves on, the live-long day,
Withdrawn, I join a group of children watching--I pause aside with
them.
By the curb, toward the edge of the flagging,
A knife-grinder works at his wheel, sharpening a great knife;
Bending over, he carefully holds it to the stone--by foot and knee,
With measur'd tread, he turns rapidly--As he presses with light but
firm hand,
Forth issue, then, in copious golden jets,
Sparkles from the wheel.
The scene, and all its belongings--how they seize and affect me!
The sad, sharp-chinn'd old man, with worn clothes, and broad
shoulder-band of leather; 10
Myself, effusing and fluid--a phantom curiously floating--now here
absorb'd and arrested;
The group, (an unminded point, set in a vast surrounding;)
The attentive, quiet children--the loud, proud, restive base of the
streets;
The low, hoarse purr of the whirling stone--the light-press'd blade,
Diffusing, dropping, sideways-darting, in tiny showers of gold,
Sparkles from the wheel.
Scheme | xxx axbxxxC bxxxx axxxxC |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1010101110111 0111011101011011 1 10101011010 01101111100011 10101100111011101 1101111001110111 11 11010100101 10101 010110101110011 01111111101 101110 1101001010001011 010010 011111001010 0010101001110110 1 0111101010111 010101100101011 10101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,112 |
Words | 159 |
Sentences | 5 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 3, 7, 5, 6 |
Lines Amount | 21 |
Letters per line (avg) | 37 |
Words per line (avg) | 9 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 194 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 48 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 22, 2023
- 49 sec read
- 215 Views
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"Sparkles From The Wheel" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 14 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/38152/sparkles-from-the-wheel>.
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