Analysis of Australia

Bernard O'Dowd 1866 (Beaufort) – 1953



LAST sea-thing dredged by sailor Time from Space,   
Are you a drift Sargasso, where the West   
In halcyon calm rebuilds her fatal nest?   
Or Delos of a coming Sun-God’s race?   
Are you for Light, and trimmed, with oil in place,           
Or but a Will o’ Wisp on marshy quest?   
A new demesne for Mammon to infest?   
Or lurks millennial Eden ’neath your face?   

The cenotaphs of species dead elsewhere   
That in your limits leap and swim and fly,           
Or trail uncanny harp-strings from your trees,   
Mix omens with the auguries that dare   
To plant the Cross upon your forehead sky,   
A virgin helpmate Ocean at your knees.


Scheme ABBAABBA CDECDE
Poetic Form Petrarchan sonnet 
Metre 1111110111 1101010101 01001010101 111010111 1111011101 1101111101 01111101 11010010111 0111011 1011010101 1101011111 11010111 1101011101 010110111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 646
Words 109
Sentences 7
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 8, 6
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 33
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 231
Words per stanza (avg) 54
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 20, 2023

32 sec read
105

Bernard O'Dowd

Bernard Patrick O'Dowd was an Australian activist, educator, poet, journalist, and author of several law books and poetry books. O'Dowd worked as an assistant-librarian and later Chief Parliamentary Draughtsman in the Supreme Court at Melbourne for 48 years; he was also a co-publisher and writer for the radical paper Tocsin. Bernard O'Dowd lived to age 87. more…

All Bernard O'Dowd poems | Bernard O'Dowd Books

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