Analysis of Indian Woman's Death-Song
Felicia Dorothea Hemans 1793 (Liverpool, Lancashire) – 1835 (Dublin, County Dublin)
Non, je ne puis vivre avec un coeur brisé® Il faut que je retrouve la joie, et que je m'unisse aux esprits libres de l'air.
Bride of Messina
,
Madame De Stael
Let not my child be a girl, for very sad is the life of a woman.
DOWN a broad river of the western wilds,
Piercing thick forest glooms, a light canoe
Swept with the current: fearful was the speed
Of the frail bark, as by a tempest's wing
Borne leaf-like on to where the mist of spray
Rose with the cataract's thunder. Yet within,
Proudly, and dauntlessly, and all alone,
Save that a babe lay sleeping at her breast,
A woman stood. Upon her Indian brow
Sat a strange gladness, and her dark hair wav'd
As if triumphantly. She press'd her child,
In its bright slumber, to her beating heart,
And lifted her sweet voice that rose awhile
Above the sound of waters, high and clear,
Wafting a wild proud strain, her Song of Death.
Roll swiftly to the Spirit's land, thou mighty stream and free!
Father of ancient waters, 5 roll! and bear our lives with thee!
The weary bird that storms have toss'd would seek the sunshine's calm,
And the deer that hath the arrow's hurt flies to the woods of balm.
Roll on! my warrior's eye hath look'd upon another's face,
And mine hath faded from his soul, as fades a moonbeam's trace;
My shadow comes not o'er his path, my whisper to his dream,
He flings away the broken reed roll swifter yet, thou stream!
The voice that spoke of other days is hush'd within his breast,
But mine its lonely music haunts, and will not let me rest;
It sings a low and mournful song of gladness that is gone,
I cannot live without that light. Father of waves! roll on!
Will he not miss the bounding step that met him from the chase?
The heart of love that made his home an ever sunny place?
The hand that spread the hunter's board, and deck'd his couch of yore?
He will not! roll, dark foaming stream, on to the better shore!
Some blessed fount amidst the woods of that bright land must flow,
Whose waters from my soul may lave the memory of this wo;
Some gentle wind must whisper there, whose breath may waft away
The burden of the heavy night, the sadness of the day.
And thou, my babe! tho' born, like me, for woman's weary lot,
Smile! to that wasting of the heart, my own! I leave thee not;
Too bright a thing art thou to pine in aching love away,
Thy mother bears thee far, young Fawn! from sorrow and decay.
She bears thee to the glorious bowers where none are heard to weep,
And where th' unkind one hath no power again to trouble sleep;
And where the soul shall find its youth, as wakening from a dream,
One moment, and that realm is ours. On, on, dark rolling stream!
Scheme | X X A X XXXXBXXCXXXXAXX DDEE FFGG CCXX FFHH AXBB IIBB JJGG |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11111111111111111111111111 11010 1 1011 111110111011011010 1011010101 1011010101 1101010101 101111011 1111110111 110110101 10010101 1101110101 01010101001 101100111 1101001101 0111010101 0100111101 0101110101 1001110111 11010101110101 101101010110111 0101111111011 001110101110111 1111111010101 0111011111011 11111011110111 11010101110111 01111101110111 11110101011111 1101010111111 11010111101111 11110101111101 01111111110101 01110101011111 11111101110101 1110101111111 110111110100111 11011101111101 01010101010101 01111111110101 11110101111111 11011111010101 11011111110001 1111010010111111 01110111110011101 0101111111101 110011110111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic heptameter |
Characters | 2,629 |
Words | 504 |
Sentences | 30 |
Stanzas | 12 |
Stanza Lengths | 1, 2, 1, 1, 15, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 48 |
Letters per line (avg) | 42 |
Words per line (avg) | 10 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 170 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 42 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 02, 2023
- 2:37 min read
- 187 Views
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"Indian Woman's Death-Song" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/13506/indian-woman%27s-death-song>.
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