Analysis of Docks
Carl Sandburg 1878 (Galesburg) – 1967 (Flat Rock)
Strolling along
By the teeming docks,
I watch the ships put out.
Black ships that heave and lunge
And move like mastodons
Arising from lethargic sleep.
The fathomed harbor
Calls them not nor dares
Them to a strain of action,
But outward, on and outward,
Sounding low-reverberating calls,
Shaggy in the half-lit distance,
They pass the pointed headland,
View the wide, far-lifting wilderness
And leap with cumulative speed
To test the challenge of the sea.
Plunging,
Doggedly onward plunging,
Into salt and mist and foam and sun.
Scheme | XABXAX XXCXXXBXXX DDC |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1001 10101 110111 111101 0111 01010101 0110 11111 1101110 1101010 10101001 10001110 110101 101110100 01110001 11010101 10 1001010 011010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 533 |
Words | 89 |
Sentences | 5 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 10, 3 |
Lines Amount | 19 |
Letters per line (avg) | 22 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 142 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 29 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 30, 2023
- 26 sec read
- 59 Views
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"Docks" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/4649/docks>.
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