Analysis of The New Zealot To The Sun

Herman Melville 1819 – 1891



Persian, you rise
Aflame from climes of sacrifice
Where adulators sue,
And prostrate man, with brow abased,
Adheres to rites whose tenor traced
All worship hitherto.

Arch type of sway,
Meetly your over-ruling ray
You fling from Asia's plain,
Whence flashed the javelins abroad
Of many a wild incursive horde
Led by some shepherd Cain.

Mid terrors dinned
Gods too came conquerors from your Ind,
The book of Brahma throve;
They came like to the scythed car,
Westward they rolled their empire far,
Of night their purple wove.

Chemist, you breed
In orient climes each sorcerous weed
That energizes dream--
Transmitted, spread in myths and creeds,
Houris and hells, delirious screeds
And Calvin's last extreme.

What though your light
In time's first dawn compelled the flight
Of Chaos' startled clan,
Shall never all your darted spears
Disperse worse Anarchs, frauds and fears,
Sprung from these weeds to man?

But Science yet
An effluence ampler shall beget,
And power beyond your play--
Shall quell the shades you fail to rout,
Yea, searching every secret out
Elucidate your ray.


Scheme AXBCCB DDECCE CCFGGF CCHXAH CCIJJI CCDCCD
Poetic Form
Metre 1011 0111110 111 0101111 01111101 11011 1111 1110101 111101 110101 1100111 111101 1101 111100111 01111 1111011 101111001 111101 1011 0101111 11001 01010101 10101001 010101 1111 01110101 110101 11011101 0111101 111111 1101 11001101 0100111 11011111 110100101 01011
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,048
Words 179
Sentences 7
Stanzas 6
Stanza Lengths 6, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6
Lines Amount 36
Letters per line (avg) 24
Words per line (avg) 5
Letters per stanza (avg) 144
Words per stanza (avg) 30
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

54 sec read
93

Herman Melville

Herman Melville was an American writer best known for the novel Moby-Dick. more…

All Herman Melville poems | Herman Melville Books

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