Analysis of My Dream
John Greenleaf Whittier 1807 (Haverhill) – 1892 (Hampton Falls)
In my dream, methought I trod,
Yesternight, a mountain road;
Narrow as Al Sirat's span,
High as eagle's flight, it ran.
Overhead, a roof of cloud
With its weight of thunder bowed;
Underneath, to left and right,
Blankness and abysmal night.
Here and there a wild-flower blushed,
Now and then a bird-song gushed;
Now and then, through rifts of shade,
Stars shone out, and sunbeams played.
But the goodly company,
Walking in that path with me,
One by one the brink o'erslid,
One by one the darkness hid.
Some with wailing and lament,
Some with cheerful courage went;
But, of all who smiled or mourned,
Never one to us returned.
Anxiously, with eye and ear,
Questioning that shadow drear,
Never hand in token stirred,
Never answering voice I heard!
Steeper, darker!--lo! I felt
From my feet the pathway melt.
Swallowed by the black despair,
And the hungry jaws of air,
Past the stony-throated caves,
Strangled by the wash of waves,
Past the splintered crags, I sank
On a green and flowery bank,--
Soft as fall of thistle-down,
Lightly as a cloud is blown,
Soothingly as childhood pressed
To the bosom of its rest.
Of the sharp-horned rocks instead,
Green the grassy meadows spread,
Bright with waters singing by
Trees that propped a golden sky.
Painless, trustful, sorrow-free,
Old lost faces welcomed me,
With whose sweetness of content
Still expectant hope was blent.
Waking while the dawning gray
Slowly brightened into day,
Pondering that vision fled,
Thus unto myself I said:--
'Steep and hung with clouds of strife
Is our narrow path of life;
And our death the dreaded fall
Through the dark, awaiting all.
'So, with painful steps we climb
Up the dizzy ways of time,
Ever in the shadow shed
By the forecast of our dread.
'Dread of mystery solved alone,
Of the untried and unknown;
Yet the end thereof may seem
Like the falling of my dream.
'And this heart-consuming care,
All our fears of here or there,
Change and absence, loss and death,
Prove but simple lack of faith.'
Thou, O Most Compassionate!
Who didst stoop to our estate,
Drinking of the cup we drain,
Treading in our path of pain,--
Through the doubt and mystery,
Grant to us thy steps to see,
And the grace to draw from thence
Larger hope and confidence.
Show thy vacant tomb, and let,
As of old, the angels sit,
Whispering, by its open door
'Fear not! He hath gone before!'
Scheme | AXBB CCDD EEFF GGAX HHXX IIJJ KKLL MMNN XOPP QQRR GGHA SSQQ TTUU VVQQ OOWW LLXX XXXX GGXX XXYY |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain (63%) |
Metre | 011111 10101 101111 1110111 1010111 1111101 011101 100101 10101101 1010111 1011111 111011 1010100 1001111 111011 1110101 1110001 1110101 1111111 1011101 1001101 100111 1010101 10100111 1010111 111011 1010101 0010111 1010101 1010111 1010111 10101001 1111101 1010111 100111 1010111 1011101 101011 1110101 1110101 101101 1110101 1110110 1010111 1010101 1010011 1001101 110111 1011111 11010111 01010101 1010101 1110111 1010111 100011 1011101 11100101 1001001 101111 1010111 0110101 11011111 1010101 1110111 1110100 11111001 1010111 10010111 1010100 1111111 0011111 1010100 1110101 1110101 10011101 1111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 2,270 |
Words | 418 |
Sentences | 21 |
Stanzas | 19 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 76 |
Letters per line (avg) | 24 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 96 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 22 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 2:05 min read
- 119 Views
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"My Dream" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/22982/my-dream>.
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