Analysis of My Bees: An Allegory
Helen Hunt Jackson 1830 (Amherst, Massachusetts) – 1885 (San Francisco)
"O bees, sweet bees!" I said, "that nearest field
Is shining white with fragrant immortelles.
Fly swiftly there and drain those honey wells."
Then, spicy pines the sunny hive to shield,
I set, and patient for the autumn's yield
Of sweet I waited.
When the village bells
Rang frosty clear, and from their satin cells
The chestnuts leaped, rejoicing, I unsealed
My hive.
Alas! no snowy honey there
Was stored. My wicked bees had borne away
Their queen and left no trace.
That very day,
An idle drone who sauntered through the air
I tracked and followed, and he led me where
My truant bees and stolen honey lay.
Twice faithless bees! They had sought out to eat
Rank, bitter herbs. The honey was not sweet.
Scheme | ABBAACBBADEFBFEEFGG |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111111101 11011101 1101011101 1101010111 1101010101 11110 10101 1101011101 0101010101 11 01110101 1111011101 110111 1101 110111101 1101001111 1101010101 111111111 1101010111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 710 |
Words | 130 |
Sentences | 13 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 19 |
Lines Amount | 19 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 549 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 126 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 06, 2023
- 38 sec read
- 132 Views
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"My Bees: An Allegory" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 23 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/17071/my-bees%3A-an-allegory>.
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