Analysis of Forms Of Prayer To Be Used At Sea
John Keble 1792 (Fairford) – 1866 (Bournemouth)
The shower of moonlight falls as still and clear
Upon this desert main
As where sweet flowers some pastoral garden cheer
With fragrance after rain:
The wild winds rustle in piping shrouds,
As in the quivering trees:
Like summer fields, beneath the shadowy clouds
The yielding waters darken in the breeze.
Thou too art here with thy soft inland tones,
Mother of our new birth;
The lonely ocean learns thy orisons,
And loves thy sacred mirth:
When storms are high, or when the fires of war
Come lightening round our course,
Thou breath'st a note like music from afar,
Tempering rude hearts with calm angelic force.
Far, far away, the homesick seaman's hoard,
Thy fragrant tokens live,
Like flower-leaves in a previous volume stored,
To solace and relieve
Some heart too weary of the restless world;
Or like thy Sabbath Cross,
That o'er this brightening billow streams unfurled,
Whatever gale the labouring vessel toss.
Oh, kindly soothing in high Victory's hour,
Or when a comrade dies,
In whose sweet presence Sorrow dares not lower,
Nor Expectation rise
Too high for earth; what mother's heart could spare
To the cold cheerless deep
Her flower and hope? but Thou art with him there,
Pledge of the untired arm and eye that cannot sleep:
The eye that watches o'er wild Ocean's dead,
Each in his coral cave,
Fondly as if the green turf wrapt his head
Fast by his father's grave, -
One moment, and the seeds of life shall spring
Out of the waste abyss,
And happy warriors triumph with their King
In worlds without a sea, unchanging orbs of bliss.
Scheme | ABABCDCD XECEXFXF GXGXHIHI JKJKLMLM NONOPQPQ |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 0101111101 011101 111101100101 110101 011100101 1001001 11010101001 0101010001 111111111 1011011 01010111 011101 11111101011 11001101 11101110101 1001111101 110101101 110101 110100100101 110001 1111010101 111101 110110010101 10101101 1101001110 11011 01110101110 10101 1111110111 10111 01001111111 11011011101 01110101101 101101 1011011111 111101 1100011111 110101 01010010111 010101010111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,596 |
Words | 271 |
Sentences | 6 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 40 |
Letters per line (avg) | 31 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 245 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 54 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:23 min read
- 26 Views
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"Forms Of Prayer To Be Used At Sea" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 13 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/23574/forms-of-prayer-to-be-used-at-sea>.
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