Analysis of It Is Not Beauty I Demand
George Darley 1795 (Dublin) – 1846 (London)
It is not Beauty I demand,
A crystal brow, the moon's despair,
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand,
Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair.
Tell me not of your starry eyes,
Your lips that seem on roses fed,
Your breasts where Cupid trembling lies,
Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed.
A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks,
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours,
A breath that softer music speaks
Than summer winds a-wooing flowers.
These are but gauds; nay, what are lips?
Coral beneath the ocean-stream,
Whose brink when your adventurer sips
Full oft he perisheth on them.
And what are cheeks but ensigns oft
That wave hot youth to fields of blood?
Did Helen's breast though ne'er so soft,
Do Greece or Ilium any good?
Eyes can with baleful ardor burn,
Poison can breath that erst perfumed,
There's many a white hand holds an urn
With lovers' hearts to dust consumed.
For crystal brows--there's naught within,
They are but empty cells for pride;
He who the Syren's hair would win
Is mostly strangled in the tide.
Give me, instead of beauty's bust,
A tender heart, a loyal mind,
Which with temptation I could trust,
Yet never linked with error find.
One in whose gentle bosom I
Could pour my secret heart of woes.
Like the care-burdened honey-fly
That hides his murmurs in the rose.
My earthly comforter! whose love
So indefeasible might be,
That when my spirit won above
Hers could not stay for sympathy.
Scheme | ABAB CDCD EFEF GXGX XXXX HIHI JKJK LMLM NONO PQPQ |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain (80%) Etheree (30%) Tetractys (20%) |
Metre | 11110101 01010101 10110011 1110111 11111101 11111101 111101001 11110111 011111 1100110 01110101 110101010 11111111 10010101 111101001 111111 0111111 11111111 11011111 1111101 11110101 10111101 110011111 11011101 11011101 11110111 1101111 11010001 1101111 01010101 11010111 11011101 10110101 11110111 10110101 11110001 11010011 1111 11110101 01111100 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,400 |
Words | 249 |
Sentences | 15 |
Stanzas | 10 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 40 |
Letters per line (avg) | 27 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 109 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 25 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:17 min read
- 46 Views
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"It Is Not Beauty I Demand" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/14912/it-is-not-beauty-i-demand>.
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