Analysis of Pre-Existence
Frances Darwin Cornford 1886 (Cambridge) – 1960 (Cambridge)
I laid me down upon the shore
And dreamed a little space;
I heard the great waves break and roar;
The sun was on my face.
My idle hands and fingers brown
Played with the pebbles grey;
The waves came up, the waves went down,
Most thundering and gay.
The pebbles, they were smooth and round
And warm upon my hands,
Like little people I had found
Sitting among the sands.
The grains of sands so shining-small
Soft through my fingers ran;
The sun shone down upon it all,
And so my dream began:
How all of this had been before;
How ages far away
I lay on some forgotten shore
As here I lie to-day.
The waves came shining up the sands,
As here to-day they shine;
And in my pre-pelasgian hands
The sand was warm and fine.
I have forgotten whence I came,
Or what my home might be,
Or by what strange and savage name
I called that thundering sea.
I only know the sun shone down
As still it shines to-day,
And in my fingers long and brown
The little pebbles lay.
Scheme | ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH ADAD FIFI JKJK CDCD |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain |
Metre | 11110101 010101 11011101 011111 11010101 110101 01110111 110001 01010101 010111 11010111 100101 01111101 111101 01110111 011101 11111101 110101 11110101 111111 01110101 111111 001111 011101 11010111 111111 11110101 1111001 11010111 111111 00110101 010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 929 |
Words | 188 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 8 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 32 |
Letters per line (avg) | 23 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 92 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 23 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 30, 2023
- 56 sec read
- 159 Views
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"Pre-Existence" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 16 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/13686/pre-existence>.
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