Analysis of The Fountain of Blood

Charles Baudelaire 1821 (Paris) – 1867 (Paris)



A fountain's pulsing sobs--like this my blood
Measures its flowing, so it sometimes seems.
I hear a gentle murmur as it streams;
Where the wound lies I've never understood.

Like water meadows, boulevards are flooded.
Cobblestones, crisscrossed by scarlet rills,
Are islands; creatures come and drink their fill.
Nothing in nature now remains unblooded.

I used to hope that wine could bring me ease,
Could lull asleep my deeply gnawing mind.
I was a fool: the senses clear with wine.

I looked to Love to cure my old disease.
Love led me to a thicket of IVs
Where bristling needles thirsted for each vein.


Scheme ABBX ABXA CXX CBX
Poetic Form
Metre 011011111 1011011011 1101010111 101111001 110110110 1011101 1101010111 100101011 1111111111 1101110101 1101010111 1111111101 111101011 1100101111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 598
Words 106
Sentences 10
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 3, 3
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 34
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 120
Words per stanza (avg) 26
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 24, 2023

32 sec read
171

Charles Baudelaire

Charles Pierre Baudelaire was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. more…

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