Analysis of Sonnet LXXXVII: Death's Songsters
Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1828 (London) – 1882 (Birchington-on-Sea)
When first that horse, within whose populous womb
The birth was death, o'ershadowed Troy with fate,
Her elders, dubious of its Grecian freight,
Brought Helen there to sing the songs of home;
She whispered, “Friends, I am alone; come, come!”
Then, crouched within, Ulysses waxed afraid,
And on his comrades' quivering mouths he laid
His hands, and held them till the voice was dumb.
The same was he who, lashed to his own mast,
There where the sea-flowers screen the charnel-caves,
Beside the sirens' singing island pass'd,
Till sweetness failed along the inveterate waves. . . .
Say, soul,—are songs of Death no heaven to thee,
Nor shames her lip the cheek of Victory?
Scheme | ABBCDEEDFGFGHH |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11110111001 01111111 01010011101 1101110111 1101110111 1101010101 0111100111 1101110111 0111111111 1101101011 0101010101 110101001001 11111111011 1101011100 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 669 |
Words | 115 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 14 |
Lines Amount | 14 |
Letters per line (avg) | 37 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 518 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 114 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 35 sec read
- 31 Views
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"Sonnet LXXXVII: Death's Songsters" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/7655/sonnet-lxxxvii%3A---death%27s-songsters>.
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