Analysis of The White Birds
William Butler Yeats 1865 (Sandymount) – 1939 (Menton)
I WOULD that we were, my beloved, white birds on the foam of the sea!
We tire of the flame of the meteor, before it can fade and flee;
And the flame of the blue star of twilight, hung low on the rim of the sky,
Has awaked in our hearts, my beloved, a sadness that may not die.
A weariness comes from those dreamers, dew-dabbled, the lily and rose;
Ah, dream not of them, my beloved, the flame of the meteor that goes,
Or the flame of the blue star that lingers hung low in the fall of the dew:
For I would we were changed to white birds on the wandering foam: I and you!
I am haunted by numberless islands, and many a Danaan shore,
Where Time would surely forget us, and Sorrow come near us no more;
Soon far from the rose and the lily and fret of the flames would we be,
Were we only white birds, my beloved, buoyed out on the foam of the sea!
Scheme | AABBCCDDEEAA |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111010111101101 110101101000111101 00110111111101101 1101011010101111 01001111011001001 11111101011010011 101101111011001101 111101111101001101 11101110010011 1111001101011111 11101001001101111 011011101101101101 |
Characters | 842 |
Words | 174 |
Sentences | 5 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 12 |
Lines Amount | 12 |
Letters per line (avg) | 54 |
Words per line (avg) | 14 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 644 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 173 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 03, 2023
- 52 sec read
- 653 Views
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