Analysis of Mother Earth
Henry Van Dyke 1852 (Germantown, Pennsylvania) – 1933 (Princeton, New Jersey)
Mother of all the high-strung poets and singers departed,
Mother of all the grass that weaves over their graves the glory of the field,
Mother of all the manifold forms of life, deep-bosomed, patient, impassive,
Silent brooder and nurse of lyrical joys and sorrows!
Out of thee, yea, surely out of the fertile depth below thy breast,
Issued in some strange way, thou lying motionless, voiceless,
All these songs of nature, rhythmical, passionate, yearning,
Coming in music from earth, but not unto earth returning.
Dust are the blood-red hearts that beat in time to these measures,
Thou hast taken them back to thyself, secretly, irresistibly
Drawing the crimson currents of life down, down, down
Deep into thy bosom again, as a river is lost in the sand.
But the souls of the singers have entered into the songs that revealed them, --
Passionate songs, immortal songs of joy and grief and love and longing:
Floating from heart to heart of thy children, they echo above thee:
Do they not utter thy heart, the voices of those that love thee?
Long hadst thou lain like a queen transformed by some old enchantment
Into an alien shape, mysterious, beautiful, speechless,
Knowing not who thou wert, till the touch of thy Lord and Lover
Working within thee awakened the man-child to breathe thy secret.
All of thy flowers and birds and forests and flowing waters
Are but enchanted forms to embody the life of the spirit;
Thou thyself, earth-mother, in mountain and meadow and ocean,
Holdest the poem of God, eternal thought and emotion.
Scheme | XXXXXABB CDXXXBDD XAXECEFF |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 101101110010010 101101111011010101 10110101111110010 1010111001010 1111101101010111 10011111010010 111110110010 100101111101010 11011111011110 111011111000100 100101011111 10111001101011001 101101011001011011 10010101110101010 1011111110110011 111101101011111 111110101111010 0111001010010010 101111101111010 1001101001111110 111100101001010 1101011010011010 1111001001010 10101101010010 |
Closest metre | Iambic octameter |
Characters | 1,517 |
Words | 263 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 51 |
Words per line (avg) | 11 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 406 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 87 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 25, 2023
- 1:18 min read
- 155 Views
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"Mother Earth" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 7 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/18354/mother-earth>.
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