Analysis of To Autumn

John Keats 1795 (Moorgate) – 1821 (Rome)



Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
   Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
   With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
   And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
       To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
   With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
       For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
   Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
   Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
   Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
       Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
   Steady thy laden head across a brook;
   Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
       Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
   Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,--
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
   And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
   Among the river sallows, borne aloft
       Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
   Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
   The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
       And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.


Scheme ABABACACAAA CDCDEFAEFFA GHGHIJAIXJA
Poetic Form
Metre 10110101 1101100101 0101111101 1101110111 1111001101 011111101 1101010101 1011011101 0111010101 0111111101 11011011101 1111110111 0101010111 110101011 1111010101 1101110101 1101110111 1011011110 001101111 1011010101 110111101 1101110110 1101111111 1111111101 111101101 0101011101 1001100111 010101101 1101011111 0111111101 1101011101 0111010101 01001010001
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 1,534
Words 257
Sentences 7
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 11, 11, 11
Lines Amount 33
Letters per line (avg) 35
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 388
Words per stanza (avg) 85
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 31, 2023

1:18 min read
174

John Keats

John Keats was an English Romantic poet. more…

All John Keats poems | John Keats Books

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