Analysis of Japanese lullaby

Eugene Field 1850 (St. Louis) – 1895 (Chicago)



Sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings,--
 Little blue pigeon with velvet eyes;
Sleep to the singing of mother-bird swinging--
 Swinging the nest where her little one lies.

Away out yonder I see a star,--
 Silvery star with a tinkling song;
To the soft dew falling I hear it calling--
 Calling and tinkling the night along.

In through the window a moonbeam comes,--
 Little gold moonbeam with misty wings;
All silently creeping, it asks, "Is he sleeping--
 Sleeping and dreaming while mother sings?"

Up from the sea there floats the sob
 Of the waves that are breaking upon the shore,
As though they were groaning in anguish, and moaning--
 Bemoaning the ship that shall come no more.

But sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings,--
 Little blue pigeon with mournful eyes;
Am I not singing?--see, I am swinging--
 Swinging the nest where my darling lies.


Scheme ABCB XDCD XACA XECE ABCB
Poetic Form Quatrain 
Metre 110100111 101101101 11010110110 1001101011 011101101 1001101001 10111011110 1001000101 01010011 10111101 110010111110 100101101 11011101 10111100101 111010010010 0100111111 1110100111 101101101 1111011110 100111101
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 847
Words 153
Sentences 7
Stanzas 5
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 20
Letters per line (avg) 33
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 132
Words per stanza (avg) 29
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

45 sec read
46

Eugene Field

Eugene Field, Sr. was an American writer, best known for his children's poetry and humorous essays. more…

All Eugene Field poems | Eugene Field Books

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    What is the term for the continuation of a sentence without a pause beyond the end of a line, couplet, or stanza.
    A Enjambment
    B Dithyramb
    C Line break
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