Analysis of The Patriot
Robert Browning 1812 (Camberwell) – 1889 (Venice)
AN OLD STORY.
It was roses, roses, all the way,
With myrtle mixed in my path like mad:
The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway,
The church-spires flamed, such flags they had,
A year ago on this very day.
The air broke into a mist with bells,
The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries.
Had I said, ``Good folk, mere noise repels---
But give me your sun from yonder skies!''
They had answered, ``And afterward, what else?''
Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun
To give it my loving friends to keep!
Nought man could do, have I left undone:
And you see my harvest, what I reap
This very day, now a year is run.
There's nobody on the house-tops now---
Just a palsied few at the windows set;
For the best of the sight is, all allow,
At the Shambles' Gate---or, better yet,
By the very scaffold's foot, I trow.
I go in the rain, and, more than needs,
A rope cuts both my wrists behind;
And I think, by the feel, my forehead bleeds,
For they fling, whoever has a mind,
Stones at me for my year's misdeeds.
Thus I entered, and thus I go!
In triumphs, people have dropped down dead.
``Paid by the world, what dost thou owe
``Me?''---God might question; now instead,
'Tis God shall repay: I am safer so.
Scheme | X ABABA CDCDX EFEFE GHGHI JKJKJ ILILI |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1110 111010101 110101111 01111101 01111111 010111101 011010111 011110101 111111101 111111101 1110110011 111111101 111110111 111111101 011110111 110110111 1110111 101110101 1011011101 101011101 10101111 110010111 01111101 0111011101 111010101 11111101 11100111 010101111 11011111 11110101 1110111101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,233 |
Words | 241 |
Sentences | 20 |
Stanzas | 7 |
Stanza Lengths | 1, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5 |
Lines Amount | 31 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 128 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 34 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 30, 2023
- 1:12 min read
- 515 Views
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"The Patriot" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/30428/the-patriot>.
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