Analysis of Ash-Boughs

Gerard Manley Hopkins 1844 (Stratford, London) – 1889 (Dublin)



Not of all my eyes see, wandering on the world,
Is anything a milk to the mind so, so sighs deep
Poetry to it, as a tree whose boughs break in the sky.
Say it is ashboughs: whether on a December day and furled
Fast ór they in clammyish lashtender combs creep
Apart wide and new-nestle at heaven most high.
They touch heaven, tabour on it; how their talons sweep
The smouldering enormous winter welkin! May
Mells blue and snowwhite through them, a fringe and fray
Of greenery: it is old earth’s groping towards the steep
Heaven whom she childs us by.

(Variant from line 7.) b.

They touch, they tabour on it, hover on it[; here, there hurled],
With talons sweep
The smouldering enormous winter welkin. [Eye,
But more cheer is when] May
Mells blue with snowwhite through their fringe and fray
Of greenery and old earth gropes for, grasps at steep
Heaven with it whom she childs things by.


Scheme ABCABCBDDBC X ABXDDBC
Poetic Form
Metre 111111100101 110011011111 10011101111001 11111010010101 11101111 011011011011 111011111101 010101011 1101110101 11001111100101 1011111 100111 1111111011111 1101 010101011 111111 111111101 110001111111 101111111
Closest metre Iambic hexameter
Characters 894
Words 165
Sentences 10
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 11, 1, 7
Lines Amount 19
Letters per line (avg) 37
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 232
Words per stanza (avg) 54
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

49 sec read
157

Gerard Manley Hopkins

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