Analysis of Southern Cross
Harold Hart Crane 1899 (Garrettsville, Ohio) – 1932 (Gulf of Mexico)
I wanted you, nameless Woman of the South,
No wraith, but utterly—as still more alone
The Southern Cross takes night
And lifts her girdles from her, one by one—
High, cool,
wide from the slowly smoldering fire
Of lower heavens,—
vaporous scars!
Eve! Magdalene!
or Mary, you?
Whatever call—falls vainly on the wave.
O simian Venus, homeless Eve,
Unwedded, stumbling gardenless to grieve
Windswept guitars on lonely decks forever;
Finally to answer all within one grave!
And this long wake of phosphor,
iridescent
Furrow of all our travel—trailed derision!
Eyes crumble at its kiss. Its long-drawn spell
Incites a yell. Slid on that backward vision
The mind is churned to spittle, whispering hell.
I wanted you . . . The embers of the Cross
Climbed by aslant and huddling aromatically.
It is blood to remember; it is fire
To stammer back . . . It is
God—your namelessness. And the wash—
All night the water combed you with black
Insolence. You crept out simmering, accomplished.
Water rattled that stinging coil, your
Rehearsed hair—docile, alas, from many arms.
Yes, Eve—wraith of my unloved seed!
The Cross, a phantom, buckled—dropped below the dawn.
Light drowned the lithic trillions of your spawn.
Scheme | XXXABCXX XX DEECD FXAGAG XBCXX XXFXX XX |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11011010101 11110011101 010111 010110111 11 1101010010 11010 11 110 1101 101110101 110010101 1100111 1011101010 10011010111 011111 010 101110101010 1101111111 01011111010 01111101001 1101010101 11101001 11110101110 110111 111001 110101111 100111100010 101011011 01110011101 11111011 010101010101 1101010111 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 1,228 |
Words | 196 |
Sentences | 25 |
Stanzas | 7 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 2, 5, 6, 5, 5, 2 |
Lines Amount | 33 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 135 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 28 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 28, 2023
- 58 sec read
- 131 Views
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"Southern Cross" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/16824/southern-cross>.
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