Analysis of An Ode to Antares
Alan Seeger 1888 (New York City) – 1916
At dusk, when lowlands where dark waters glide
Robe in gray mist, and through the greening hills
The hoot-owl calls his mate, and whippoorwills
Clamor from every copse and orchard-side,
I watched the red star rising in the East,
And while his fellows of the flaming sign
From prisoning daylight more and more released,
Lift their pale lamps, and, climbing higher, higher,
Out of their locks the waters of the Line
Shaking in clouds of phosphorescent fire,
Rose in the splendor of their curving flight,
Their dolphin leap across the austral night,
From windows southward opening on the sea
What eyes, I wondered, might be watching, too,
Orbed in some blossom-laden balcony.
Where, from the garden to the rail above,
As though a lover's greeting to his love
Should borrow body and form and hue
And tower in torrents of floral flame,
The crimson bougainvillea grew,
What starlit brow uplifted to the same
Majestic regress of the summering sky,
What ultimate thing -- hushed, holy, throned as high
Above the currents that tarnish and profane
As silver summits are whose pure repose
No curious eyes disclose
Nor any footfalls stain,
But round their beauty on azure evenings
Only the oreads go on gauzy wings,
Only the oreads troop with dance and song
And airy beings in rainbow mists who throng
Out of those wonderful worlds that lie afar
Betwixt the outmost cloud and the nearest star.
Like the moon, sanguine in the orient night
Shines the red flower in her beautiful hair.
Her breasts are distant islands of delight
Upon a sea where all is soft and fair.
Those robes that make a silken sheath
For each lithe attitude that flows beneath,
Shrouding in scented folds sweet warmths and tumid flowers,
Call them far clouds that half emerge
Beyond a sunset ocean's utmost verge,
Hiding in purple shade and downpour of soft showers
Enchanted isles by mortal foot untrod,
And there in humid dells resplendent orchids nod;
There always from serene horizons blow
Soul-easing gales and there all spice-trees grow
That Phoenix robbed to line his fragrant nest
Each hundred years in Araby the Blest.
Star of the South that now through orient mist
At nightfall off Tampico or Belize
Greetest the sailor rising from those seas
Where first in me, a fond romanticist,
The tropic sunset's bloom on cloudy piles
Cast out industrious cares with dreams of fabulous isles --
Thou lamp of the swart lover to his tryst,
O'er planted acres at the jungle's rim
Reeking with orange-flower and tuberose,
Dear to his eyes thy ruddy splendor glows
Among the palms where beauty waits for him;
Bliss too thou bringst to our greening North,
Red scintillant through cherry-blossom rifts,
Herald of summer-heat, and all the gifts
And all the joys a summer can bring forth ----
Be thou my star, for I have made my aim
To follow loveliness till autumn-strown
Sunder the sinews of this flower-like frame
As rose-leaves sunder when the bud is blown.
Ay, sooner spirit and sense disintegrate
Than reconcilement to a common fate
Strip the enchantment from a world so dressed
In hues of high romance. I cannot rest
While aught of beauty in any path untrod
Swells into bloom and spreads sweet charms abroad
Unworshipped of my love. I cannot see
In Life's profusion and passionate brevity
How hearts enamored of life can strain too much
In one long tension to hear, to see, to touch.
Now on each rustling night-wind from the South
Far music calls; beyond the harbor mouth
Each outbound argosy with sail unfurled
May point the path through this fortuitous world
That holds the heart from its desire. Away!
Where tinted coast-towns gleam at close of day,
Where squares are sweet with bells, or shores thick set
With bloom and bower, with mosque and minaret.
Blue peaks loom up beyond the coast-plains here,
White roads wind up the dales and disappear,
By silvery waters in the plains afar
Glimmers the inland city like a star,
With gilded gates and sunny spires ablaze
And burnished domes half-seen through luminous haze,
Lo, with what opportunity Earth teems!
How like a fair its ample beauty seems!
Fluttering with flags its proud pavilions rise:
What bright bazaars, what marvelous merchandise,
Down seething alleys what melodious din,
What clamor importuning from every booth!
At Earth's great market where Joy is trafficked in
Buy while thy purse yet swells with golden Youth!
Scheme | Text too long |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 111111101 1011010101 011111010 10110010101 1101110001 0111010101 11110101 11110101010 1111010101 10011110 1001011101 1101010101 11010100101 1111011101 1011010100 1101010101 1101010111 11100101 0100101101 0101001 1101100101 010101011 11001110111 01010110001 1101011101 1100101 11011 1111011010 10011111 100111101 0101001111 11110011101 0101100101 1011000101 10110001001 0111010101 0101111101 11110101 111101101 100101110110 11111101 01011011 1001010101110 010111011 010101010101 111010101 1101011111 1101111101 11010101 1101111101 1111101 101010111 1101011 010111101 11010011111001 1110110111 1010101011 101101001 1111110101 0101110111 1111110101 11110101 1011010101 0101010111 1111111111 11011101 1001111011 1111010111 1101001010 1110101 1001010111 0111011101 1111001011 1011011101 11111101 010100100100 11010111111 01110111111 1111011101 1101010101 111001101 11011101001 11011101001 1101111111 1111111111 1101011001 1111010111 111101001 11001000101 100110101 1101010101 01011111001 111010011 1101110101 10011110101 1101110010 11010101001 110111001 1111011110 1111111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 4,341 |
Words | 740 |
Sentences | 17 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 33, 16, 15, 36 |
Lines Amount | 100 |
Letters per line (avg) | 35 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 873 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 185 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 3:44 min read
- 100 Views
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"An Ode to Antares" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 9 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/288/an-ode-to-antares>.
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