Analysis of A Song In Praise
Ambrose Bierce 1842 (Meigs County) – 1914 (Chihuahua)
Hail, blessed Blunder! golden idol, hail!
Clay-footed deity of all who fail.
Celestial image, let thy glory shine,
Thy feet concealing, but a lamp to mine.
Let me, at seasons opportune and fit,
By turns adore thee and by turns commit.
In thy high service let me ever be
(Yet never serve thee as my critics me)
Happy and fallible, content to feel
I blunder chiefly when to thee I kneel.
But best felicity is his thy praise
Who utters unaware in works and ways
Who _laborare est orare_ proves,
And feels thy suasion wheresoe'er he moves,
Serving thy purpose, not thine altar, still,
And working, for he thinks it his, thy will.
If such a life with blessings be not fraught,
I envy Peter Robertson for naught.
Scheme | AABBCCDDEEFFGGHHII |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 111010101 1101001111 0101011101 1101010111 111100101 1101101101 0111011101 1101111101 1001001011 1101011111 1101001111 110010101 110111 01110111 1011011101 0101111111 1101110111 1101010011 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 697 |
Words | 130 |
Sentences | 9 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 18 |
Lines Amount | 18 |
Letters per line (avg) | 31 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 551 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 128 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 39 sec read
- 127 Views
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"A Song In Praise" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 14 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/1664/a-song-in-praise>.
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