Analysis of Tears, flow no more

Edward Herbert 1582 (Eyton-on-Severn) – 1648 (London)



TEARS, flow no more, or if you needs must flow,
           Fall yet more slow,
       Do not the world invade,
From smaller springs than yours rivers have grown,
       And they again a Sea have made,
Brackish like you, and which like you hath flown.

Ebb to my heart, and on the burning fires
           Of my desires,
       O let your torrents fall,
From smaller heate than theirs such sparks arise
       As into flame converting all,
This world might be but my love's sacrifice.

Yet if the tempests of my sighs so blow
           You both must flow,
       And my desires still burn,
Since that in vain all help my love requires,
   Why may not yet their rages turn
To dry those tears, and to blow out those fires ?


Scheme AABCBC DDEXEX AAFDFD
Poetic Form
Metre 1111111111 1111 110101 1101111011 01010111 1011011111 11110101010 11010 111101 1101111101 10110101 111111110 110111111 1111 0101011 11011111010 11111101 11110111110
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 711
Words 127
Sentences 4
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 6, 6, 6
Lines Amount 18
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 168
Words per stanza (avg) 42
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

38 sec read
79

Edward Herbert

Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury (or Chirbury) KB was an Anglo-Welsh soldier, diplomat, historian, poet and religious philosopher of the Kingdom of England. more…

All Edward Herbert poems | Edward Herbert Books

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