Analysis of The Ant
Richard Lovelace 1618 – 1657
Forbear, thou great good husband, little ant;
A little respite from thy flood of sweat!
Thou, thine own horse and cart under this plant,
Thy spacious tent, fan thy prodigious heat;
Down with thy double load of that one grain!
It is a granarie for all thy train.
Cease, large example of wise thrift, awhile
(For thy example is become our law),
And teach thy frowns a seasonable smile:
So Cato sometimes the nak'd Florals saw.
And thou, almighty foe, lay by thy sting,
Whilst thy unpay'd musicians, crickets, sing.
Lucasta, she that holy makes the day,
And 'stills new life in fields of fueillemort,
Hath back restor'd their verdure with one ray,
And with her eye bid all to play and sport,
Ant, to work still! age will thee truant call;
And to save now, th'art worse than prodigal.
Austere and cynick! not one hour t' allow,
To lose with pleasure, what thou gotst with pain;
But drive on sacred festivals thy plow,
Tearing high-ways with thy ore-charged wain.
Not all thy life-time one poor minute live,
And thy ore-labour'd bulk with mirth relieve?
Look up then, miserable ant, and spie
Thy fatal foes, for breaking of their law,
Hov'ring above thee: Madam Margaret Pie:
And her fierce servant, meagre Sir John Daw:
Thy self and storehouse now they do store up,
And thy whole harvest too within their crop.
Thus we unthrifty thrive within earth's tomb
For some more rav'nous and ambitious jaw:
The grain in th' ant's, the ant in the pie's womb,
The pie in th' hawk's, the hawk ith' eagle's maw.
So scattering to hord 'gainst a long day,
Thinking to save all, we cast all away.
Scheme | AXAXBB CDCDEE FAFXXX GBGBXX XDXDXX HDHDFF |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 111110101 0101011111 1111011011 1101110101 1111011111 11011111 1101011101 11010101101 0111010001 11001010101 0101011111 111010101 11110101 01110111 110111111 0101111101 1111111101 011111111100 01011110101 1111011111 1111010011 101111111 1111111101 011111101 1111000101 1101110111 1011101001 001101111 110111111 0111010111 11110111 111100101 010111010011 010111011101 1100111011 1011111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,596 |
Words | 290 |
Sentences | 20 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 |
Lines Amount | 36 |
Letters per line (avg) | 34 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 202 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 47 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 26, 2023
- 1:30 min read
- 118 Views
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"The Ant" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/30220/the-ant>.
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