Analysis of Song of the Stars
William Cullen Bryant 1794 (Cummington) – 1878 (New York City)
When the radiant morn of creation broke,
And the world in the smile of God awoke,
And the empty realms of darkness and death
Were moved through their depths by his mighty breath,
And orbs of beauty and spheres of flame
From the void abyss by myriads came, -
In the joy of youth as they darted away,
Through the widening wastes of space to play,
Their silver voices in chorus rung,
And this was the song of the bright ones sung.
'Away, away, through the wide, wide sky, -
The fair blue fields that before us lie, -
Each sun with the worlds that round him roll,
Each planet poised on her turning pole;
With her isles of green and her clouds of white,
And her waters that lie like fluid light.
'For the Source of Glory uncovers his face,
And the brightness o'erflows unbounded space;
And we drink, as we go, the luminous tides
In our ruddy air and our blooming sides;
Lo, yonder the living splendors play;
Away, on our joyous path, away!
'Look, look, through our glittering ranks afar,
In the infinite azure, star after star,
How they brighten and bloom as they swiftly pass!
How the verdure runs o'er each rolling mass!
And the path of the gentle winds is seen,
Where the small waves dance, and the young woods lean.
'And see, where brighten day-beams pour,
How the rainbows hang in the sunny shower;
And the morn and eve, with their pomp of hues,
Shift o'er the bright planets and shed their dues;
And 'twixt them both, o'er the teeming ground,
With her shadowy cone the night goes round!
'Away, away! in our blossoming bowers,
In the soft air wrapping these spheres of ours,
In the seas and fountains that shine with morn,
See, love is brooding, and life is born,
And breathing myriads are breaking from night,
To rejoice like us, in motion and light.
'Glide on in your beauty, ye youthful spheres,
To weave the dance that measures the years;
Glide on, in the glory of gladness sent,
To the farthest wall of the firmament, -
The boundless visible smile of Him,
To the veil of whose brow your lamps are dim.'
Scheme | AABBCCDDEE FFGGHH IIJJDD KKLLMM XXNNOO PPQQHH RRXHSS |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 10100110101 0010011101 0010111001 0111111101 011100111 10101111 00111111001 1010011111 110100101 0110110111 010110111 011110111 111011111 110110101 1011100111 0010111101 1011101011 001010101 01111101001 010101010101 11001011 0111010101 11110100101 00100101101 11100111101 1011101101 0011010111 1011100111 01110111 1011001010 0010111111 11001100111 0111100101 1010010111 010101010010 00111011110 0010101111 111100111 010111011 1011101001 1101101101 110111001 110010111 10101101 010100111 1011111111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,973 |
Words | 373 |
Sentences | 11 |
Stanzas | 7 |
Stanza Lengths | 10, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 |
Lines Amount | 46 |
Letters per line (avg) | 34 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 222 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 53 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:52 min read
- 90 Views
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"Song of the Stars" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 3 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/40320/song-of-the-stars>.
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