Analysis of I’ll tell you how the sun rose

Emily Dickinson 1830 (Amherst) – 1886 (Amherst)



I’ll tell you how the sun rose, -
A ribbon at a time.
The steeples swam in amethyst,
The news like squirrels ran.

The hills untied their bonnets,
The bobolinks begun.
Then I said softly to myself,
"That must have been the sun!"

But how he set, I know not.
There seemed a purple stile.
Which little yellow boys and girls
Were climbing all the while

Till when they reached the other side,
A dominie in gray
Put gently up the evening bars,
And led the flock away.


Scheme AXXX ABXB XCXC XDXD
Poetic Form Quatrain  (75%)
Metre 1111011 010101 01010100 011101 010111 0101 1111011 111101 1111111 110101 11010101 010101 11110101 0101 11010101 010101
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 455
Words 91
Sentences 8
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 16
Letters per line (avg) 22
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 89
Words per stanza (avg) 22
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 26, 2023

27 sec read
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Emily Dickinson

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American poet. more…

All Emily Dickinson poems | Emily Dickinson Books

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