Analysis of Amelia
Coventry Patmore 1823 (Woodford, London) – 1896 (Lymington)
Whene'er mine eyes do my Amelia greet
It is with such emotion
As when, in childhood, turning a dim street,
I first beheld the ocean.
There, where the little, bright, surf-breathing town,
That shew'd me first her beauty and the sea,
Gathers its skirts against the gorse-lit down
And scatters gardens o'er the southern lea,
Abides this Maid
Within a kind, yet sombre Mother's shade,
Who of her daughter's graces seems almost afraid,
Viewing them ofttimes with a scared forecast,
Caught, haply, from obscure love-peril past.
Howe'er that be,
She scants me of my right,
Is cunning careful evermore to balk
Sweet separate talk,
And fevers my delight
By frets, if, on Amelia's cheek of peach,
I touch the notes which music cannot reach,
Bidding ‘Good-night!’
Wherefore it came that, till to-day's dear date,
I curs'd the weary months which yet I have to wait
Ere I find heaven, one-nested with my mate.
To-day, the Mother gave,
To urgent pleas and promise to behave
As she were there, her long-besought consent
To trust Amelia with me to the grave
Where lay my once-betrothed, Millicent:
‘For,’ said she, hiding ill a moistening eye,
‘Though, Sir, the word sounds hard,
God makes as if He least knew how to guard
The treasure He loves best, simplicity.’
And there Amelia stood, for fairness shewn
Like a young apple-tree, in flush'd array
Of white and ruddy flow'r, auroral, gay,
With chilly blue the maiden branch between;
And yet to look on her moved less the mind
To say ‘How beauteous!’ than ‘How good and kind!’
And so we went alone
By walls o'er which the lilac's numerous plume
Shook down perfume;
Trim plots close blown
With daisies, in conspicuous myriads seen,
Engross'd each one
With single ardour for her spouse, the sun;
Garths in their glad array
Of white and ruddy branch, auroral, gay,
With azure chill the maiden flow'r between;
Meadows of fervid green,
With sometime sudden prospect of untold
Cowslips, like chance-found gold;
And broadcast buttercups at joyful gaze,
Rending the air with praise,
Like the six-hundred-thousand-voiced shout
Of Jacob camp'd in Midian put to rout;
Then through the Park,
Where Spring to livelier gloom
Quicken'd the cedars dark,
And, 'gainst the clear sky cold,
Which shone afar
Crowded with sunny alps oracular,
Great chestnuts raised themselves abroad like cliffs of bloom;
And everywhere,
Amid the ceaseless rapture of the lark,
With wonder new
We caught the solemn voice of single air,
‘Cuckoo!’
And when Amelia, 'bolden'd, saw and heard
How bravely sang the bird,
And all things in God's bounty did rejoice,
She who, her Mother by, spake seldom word,
Did her charm'd silence doff,
And, to my happy marvel, her dear voice
Went as a clock does, when the pendulum's off.
Ill Monarch of man's heart the Maiden who
Does not aspire to be High-Pontiff too!
So she repeated soft her Poet's line,
‘By grace divine,
Not otherwise, O Nature, are we thine!’
And I, up the bright steep she led me, trod,
And the like thought pursued
With, ‘What is gladness without gratitude,
And where is gratitude without a God?’
And of delight, the guerdon of His laws,
She spake, in learned mood;
And I, of Him loved reverently, as Cause,
Her sweetly, as Occasion of all good.
Nor were we shy,
For souls in heaven that be
May talk of heaven without hypocrisy.
And now, when we drew near
The low, gray Church, in its sequester'd dell,
A shade upon me fell.
Dead Millicent indeed had been most sweet,
But I how little meet
To call such graces in a Maiden mine!
A boy's proud passion free affection blunts;
His well-meant flatteries oft are blind affronts;
And many a tear
Was Millicent's before I, manlier, knew
That maidens shine
As diamonds do,
Which, though most clear,
Are not to be seen through;
And, if she put her virgin self aside
And sate her, crownless, at my conquering feet,
It should have bred in me humility, not pride.
Amelia had more luck than Millicent:
Secure she smiled and warm from all mischance
Or from my knowledge or my ignorance,
And glow'd content
With my—some might have thought too much—superior age,
Which seem'd the gage
Of steady kindness all on her intent.
Thus nought forbade us to be fully blent.
While, therefore, now
Her pensive footstep stirr'd
The darnell'd garden of unheedful death,
She ask'd what Millicent was like, and heard
Of eyes like her's, and honeysuckle breath,
And of a wiser tha
Scheme | Text too long |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 111110101 1111010 110110011 111010 1101011101 1111010001 1011010111 0110100101 0111 010111101 11010101101 10111011 111011101 1011 111111 110101011 1101 010101 11111111 1101110101 1011 111111111 110101111111 11110110111 110101 1101010101 110101101 1101011101 11111100 111101011 110111 1111111111 0101110100 0101011101 1011010101 11010110101 1101010101 0111101101 111111101 011101 11101011001 1101 1111 1100010011 0111 110110101 101101 1101010101 11010101101 11101 111010101 11111 01101101 100111 101101011 110101111 1101 1111001 100101 010111 1101 1011011 110101011111 010 0101010101 1101 1101011101 1 010101101 110101 0110110101 1101011101 101101 0111010011 110111011 111110101 1101111101 1101010101 1101 110110111 0110111111 001101 11110110 011100101 010101111 11011 01111100011 0101010111 1011 1101011 11110010100 011111 0111010101 010111 1100011111 111101 1111000101 0111010101 111111101 01001 1101111 1101 1101 1111 111111 0111010101 0101111001 111101010011 0101111100 011101111 1111011100 0110 1111111101001 1101 1101011001 1101111101 111 01011 0110111 1111001101 111101001 010101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 4,268 |
Words | 761 |
Sentences | 20 |
Stanzas | 8 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 20, 9, 6, 29, 23, 25, 6 |
Lines Amount | 122 |
Letters per line (avg) | 28 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 424 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 94 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 26, 2023
- 3:58 min read
- 135 Views
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"Amelia" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/7335/amelia>.
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