Analysis of Waterfall
James Thomson 1700 (Port Glasgow) – 1748 (London)
Smooth to the shelving brink a copious flood
Rolls fair and placid: where collected all,
In one impetuous torrent down the steep
It thundering shoots, and shakes the country round.
At first, an azure sheet, it rushes broad;
Then whitening by degrees, as prone it falls,
And from the loud-resounding rocks below,
Dash'd in a cloud of foam, it sends aloft
A hoary mist, and forms a ceaseless shower.
Nor can the tortured wave here find repose:
But, raging still amid the shaggy rocks,
Now flashes o'er the scatter'd fragments, now
Aslant the hollow channel rapid darts;
And falling fast from gradual slope to slope,
With wild infracted course, and lessen'd roar,
It gains a safer bed, and steals, at last,
Along the mazes of a quiet vale.
Scheme | ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQ |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11010101001 1101010101 0101010101 11001010101 1111011101 11001011111 0101010101 1001111101 01010101010 1101011101 1101010101 11010010101 101010101 01011100111 11110101 1101010111 0101010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 728 |
Words | 130 |
Sentences | 4 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 17 |
Lines Amount | 17 |
Letters per line (avg) | 34 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 579 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 128 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 03, 2023
- 40 sec read
- 126 Views
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"Waterfall" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/20643/waterfall>.
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