Analysis of The Shepherd’s Brow, Fronting Forked Lightning, Owns
Gerard Manley Hopkins 1844 (Stratford, London) – 1889 (Dublin)
The shepherd's brow, fronting forked lightning, owns
The horror and the havoc and the glory
Of it. Angels fall, they are towers, from heaven—a story
Of just, majestical, and giant groans.
But man—we, scaffold of score brittle bones;
Who breathe, from groundlong babyhood to hoary
Age gasp; whose breath is our memento mori—
What bass is our viol for tragic tones?
He! Hand to mouth he lives, and voids with shame;
And, blazoned in however bold the name,
Man Jack the man is, just; his mate a hussy.
And I that die these deaths, that feed this flame,
That … in smooth spoons spy life’s masque mirrored: tame
My tempests there, my fire and fever fussy.
Scheme | ABBAABBACCBCCB |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 0101101101 01000100010 111011110110010 1110101 1111011101 111110110 111111001010 1111011101 1111110111 01010101 11011111010 0111111111 1011111101 11111001010 |
Closest metre | Iambic hexameter |
Characters | 666 |
Words | 118 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 14 |
Lines Amount | 14 |
Letters per line (avg) | 36 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 503 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 116 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 12, 2023
- 35 sec read
- 81 Views
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"The Shepherd’s Brow, Fronting Forked Lightning, Owns" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/15902/the-shepherd%E2%80%99s-brow%2C-fronting-forked-lightning%2C-owns>.
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