Analysis of William H. Herndon
Edgar Lee Masters 1868 (Garnett) – 1950 (Elkins Park)
There by the window in the old house
Perched on the bluff, overlooking miles of valley,
My days of labor closed, sitting out life's decline,
Day by day did I look in my memory,
As one who gazes in an enchantress' crystal globe,
And I saw the figures of the past,
As if in a pageant glassed by a shining dream,
Move through the incredible sphere of time.
And I saw a man arise from the soil like a fabled giant
And throw himself over a deathless destiny,
Master of great armies, head of the republic,
Bringing together into a dithyramb of recreative song
The epic hopes of a people;
At the same time Vulcan of sovereign fires,
Where imperishable shields and swords were beaten out
From spirits tempered in heaven.
Look in the crystal! See how he hastens on
To the place where his path comes up to the path
Of a child of Plutarch and Shakespeare.
O Lincoln, actor indeed, playing well your part,
And Booth, who strode in a mimic play within the play,
Often and often I saw you,
As the cawing crows winged their way to the wood
Over my house-top at solemn sunsets,
There by my window,
Alone.
Scheme | ABCBDEFGHBIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 110100011 11011001110 111101101101 11111101100 11110011101 011010101 110010110101 1100100111 0110101101101010 01011001100 101110110010 1001001010111 01011010 10111011010 111010101 11010010 10010111101 10111111101 1011101 110100110111 0111001010101 10010111 1011111101 101111101 11110 01 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,071 |
Words | 206 |
Sentences | 6 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 26 |
Lines Amount | 26 |
Letters per line (avg) | 33 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 856 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 204 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:02 min read
- 87 Views
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"William H. Herndon" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 6 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/8746/william-h.-herndon>.
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