Analysis of Fragment Of A Sleep-Song
Sydney Thompson Dobell 1824 (Kent) – 1874
SISTER Simplicitie,
Sing, sing a song to me,
Sing me to sleep.
Some legend low and long,
Slow as the summer song
Of the dull Deep.
Some legend long and low,
Whose equal ebb and flow
To and fro creep
On the dim marge of gray
’Tween the soul’s night and day,
Washing “awake” away
Into “asleep.”
Some legend low and long,
Never so weak or strong
As to let go
While it can hold this heart
Withouten sigh or smart,
Or as to hold this heart
When it sighs “No.”
Some long low swaying song,
As the sway’d shadow long
Sways to and fro
Where, thro’ the crowing cocks,
And by the swinging clocks,
Some weary mother rocks
Some weary woe.
Sing up and down to me
Like a dream-boat at sea,
So, and still so,
Float through the “then” and “when,”
Rising from when to then,
Sinking from then to when
While the waves go.
Low and high, high and low,
Now and then, then and now,
Mow, now;
And when the now is then, and when the then is now,
And when the low is high, and when the high is low,
Low, low;
Let me float, let the boat
Go, go;
Let me glide, let me slide
Slow, slow;
Gliding boat, sliding boat,
Slow, slow;
Glide away, slide away
So, so.
Scheme | abcDdc eecfafc Ddeaaae ddeggge bbehhhe eiiieeaeaEaEfe |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 101 110111 1111 110101 110101 1011 110101 110101 1011 101111 101101 100101 0101 110101 101111 1111 111111 1111 111111 1111 111101 10111 1101 110101 010101 110101 1101 110111 101111 1011 110101 101111 101111 1011 101101 101101 11 010111010111 010111010111 11 111101 11 111111 11 101101 11 101101 11 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 1,201 |
Words | 230 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 7, 7, 7, 7, 14 |
Lines Amount | 48 |
Letters per line (avg) | 17 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 140 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 38 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:09 min read
- 22 Views
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"Fragment Of A Sleep-Song" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/35887/fragment-of-a-sleep-song>.
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