Analysis of A Lamentation
Algernon Charles Swinburne 1837 (London) – 1909 (London)
I.
WHO hath known the ways of time
Or trodden behind his feet?
There is no such man among men.
For chance overcomes him, or crime
Changes; for all things sweet
In time wax bitter again.
Who shall give sorrow enough,
Or who the abundance of tears?
Mine eyes are heavy with love
And a sword gone thorough mine ears,
A sound like a sword and fire,
For pity, for great desire;
Who shall ensure me thereof,
Lest I die, being full of my fears?
Who hath known the ways and the wrath,
The sleepless spirit, the root
And blossom of evil will,
The divine device of a god?
Who shall behold it or hath?
The twice-tongued prophets are mute,
The many speakers are still;
No foot has travelled or trod,
No hand has meted, his path.
Man’s fate is a blood-red fruit,
And the mighty gods have their fill
And relax not the rein, or the rod.
Ye were mighty in heart from of old,
Ye slew with the spear, and are slain.
Keen after heat is the cold,
Sore after summer is rain,
And melteth man to the bone.
As water he weareth away,
As a flower, as an hour in a day,
Fallen from laughter to moan.
But my spirit is shaken with fear
Lest an evil thing begin,
New-born, a spear for a spear,
And one for another sin.
Or ever our tears began,
It was known from of old and said;
One law for a living man,
And another law for the dead.
For these are fearful and sad,
Vain, and things without breath;
While he lives let a man be glad,
For none hath joy of his death.
II.
Who hath known the pain, the old pain of earth,
Or all the travail of the sea,
The many ways and waves, the birth
Fruitless, the labour nothing worth?
Who hath known, who knoweth, O gods? not we.
There is none shall say he hath seen,
There is none he hath known.
Though he saith, Lo, a lord have I been,
I have reaped and sown;
I have seen the desire of mine eyes,
The beginning of love,
The season of kisses and sighs
And the end thereof.
I have known the ways of the sea,
All the perilous ways,
Strange winds have spoken with me,
And the tongues of strange days.
I have hewn the pine for ships;
Where steeds run arow,
I have seen from their bridled lips
Foam blown as the snow.
With snapping of chariot-poles
And with straining of oars
I have grazed in the race the goals,
In the storm the shores;
As a greave is cleft with an arrow
At the joint of the knee,
I have cleft through the sea-straits narrow
To the heart of the sea.
When air was smitten in sunder
I have watched on high
The ways of the stars and the thunder
In the night of the sky;
Where the dark brings forth light as a flower,
As from lips that dissever;
One abideth the space of an hour,
One endureth for ever.
Lo, what hath he seen or known,
Of the way and the wave
Unbeholden, unsailed-on, unsown,
From the breast to the grave?
Or ever the stars were made, or skies,
Grief was born, and the kinless night,
Mother of gods without form or name.
And light is born out of heaven and dies,
And one day knows not another’s light,
But night is one, and her shape the same.
But dumb the goddesses underground
Wait, and we hear not on earth if their feet
Rise, and the night wax loud with their wings;
Dumb, without word or shadow of sound;
And sift in scales and winnow as wheat
Men’s souls, and sorrow of manifold things.
III.
Nor less of grief than ours
The gods wrought long ago
To bruise men one by one;
But with the incessant hours
Fresh grief and greener woe
Spring, as the sudden sun
Year after year makes flowers;
And these die down and grow,
And the next year lacks none.
As these men sleep, have slept
The old heroes in time fled,
No dream-divided sleep;
And holier eyes have wept
Than ours, when on her dead
Gods have seen Thetis weep,
With heavenly hair far-swept
Back, heavenly hands outspread
Round what she could not keep,
Could not one day withhold,
One night; and like as these
White ashes of no weight,
Held not his urn the cold
Ashes of Heracles?
For all things born one gate
Opens, no gate of gold;
Opens; and no man sees
Beyond the gods and fate.
Scheme | Text too long |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1 1110111 1100111 11111011 1110111 101111 0111001 1111001 11001011 1111011 00111011 01101010 11011010 110111 111101111 11101001 0101001 0101101 00101101 1101111 0111011 0101011 1111011 1111011 1110111 00101111 001101101 101001111 11101011 1101101 1101011 011101 1101101 10101110001 1011011 111011011 1110101 1101101 0110101 11010101 11111101 1110101 00101101 1111001 101011 11110111 1111111 1 1110101111 11001101 01010101 1001101 111111111 11111111 111111 111101111 11101 1110010111 001011 01011001 0011 11101101 101001 1111011 001111 1110111 1111 11111101 11101 11011001 011011 11100101 00101 101111110 101101 111101110 101101 11110010 11111 011010010 001101 1011111010 11111 11011110 11110 1111111 101001 1111 101101 110010111 1110011 101101111 0111111001 0111111 111100101 11010010 1011111111 100111111 10111111 01010111 110101101 1 1111110 011101 111111 11001010 110101 110101 1101110 011101 001111 111111 0110011 110101 0100111 1101101 111101 1100111 110011 111111 111101 110111 110111 111101 1011 111111 101111 100111 010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 3,854 |
Words | 777 |
Sentences | 35 |
Stanzas | 9 |
Stanza Lengths | 15, 12, 20, 42, 6, 6, 10, 9, 9 |
Lines Amount | 129 |
Letters per line (avg) | 24 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 339 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 86 |
Font size:
Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 3:53 min read
- 118 Views
Citation
Use the citation below to add this poem analysis to your bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"A Lamentation" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/1242/a-lamentation>.
Discuss this Algernon Charles Swinburne poem analysis with the community:
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In