Analysis of The Wild Honey-Suckle

Philip Freneau 1752 (New York City) – 1832 (Matawan)



Fair flower, that dost so comely grow,
Hid in this silent, dull retreat,
Untouched thy honied blossoms blow,
Unseen thy little branches greet;
...No roving foot shall crush thee here,
...No busy hand provoke a tear.

By Nature's self in white arrayed,
She bade thee shun the vulgar eye,
And planted here the gaurdian shade,
And sent soft waters murmuring by;
...Thus quietly thy summer goes,
...Thy days declinging to repose.

Smit with those charms, that must decay,
I grieve to see your future doom;
They died--nor were those flowers more gay,
The flowers that did in Eden bloom;
...Unpitying frosts, and Autumn's power
...Shall leave no vestige of this flower.

From morning suns and evenign dews
At first thy little being came:
If nothing once, you nothing lose,
For when you die you are the same;
...The space between, is but an hour,
...The frail duration of a flower.


Scheme ABABXX CDCDEE FGFGHH IJIJHH
Poetic Form
Metre 110111101 10110101 0111101 01110101 11011111 11010101 11010101 11110101 0101011 011101001 11001101 111101 11111101 11111101 111011011 010110101 1101010 111101110 1101011 11110101 11011101 11111101 010111110 011101010
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 856
Words 152
Sentences 13
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 6, 6, 6, 6
Lines Amount 24
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 167
Words per stanza (avg) 38
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 02, 2023

46 sec read
167

Philip Freneau

Philip Morin Freneau was an American poet, nationalist, polemicist, sea captain and newspaper editor sometimes called the "Poet of the American Revolution". more…

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