Analysis of Samuel Gardner
Edgar Lee Masters 1868 (Garnett) – 1950 (Elkins Park)
I who kept the greenhouse,
Lover of trees and flowers,
Oft in life saw this umbrageous elm,
Measuring its generous branches with my eye,
And listened to its rejoicing leaves
Lovingly patting each other
With sweet aeolian whispers.
And well they might:
For the roots had grown so wide and deep
That the soil of the hill could not withhold
Aught of its virtue, enriched by rain,
And warmed by the sun;
But yielded it all to the thrifty roots,
Through which it was drawn and whirled to the trunk,
And thence to the branches, and into the leaves,
Wherefrom the breeze took life and sang.
Now I, an under-tenant of the earth, can see
That the branches of a tree
Spread no wider than its roots.
And how shall the soul of a man
Be larger than the life he has lived?
Scheme | ABCDEFBGHIJKLMENOOLPQ |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11101 1011010 1011111 100110010111 010110101 10010110 11110 0111 101111101 1011011101 111100111 01101 1101110101 1111101101 01101000101 1011101 111101010111 1010101 1110111 01101101 110101111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 746 |
Words | 145 |
Sentences | 5 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 21 |
Lines Amount | 21 |
Letters per line (avg) | 28 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 597 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 143 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 21, 2023
- 43 sec read
- 100 Views
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"Samuel Gardner" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 1 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/8709/samuel-gardner>.
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