Analysis of September in Australia

Henry Kendall 1839 (Australia) – 1882 (Sydney)



Grey Winter hath gone, like a wearisome guest,
   And, behold, for repayment,
September comes in with the wind of the West
   And the Spring in her raiment!
The ways of the frost have been filled of the flowers,
   While the forest discovers
Wild wings, with the halo of hyaline hours,
   And the music of lovers.

September, the maid with the swift, silver feet!
   She glides, and she graces
The valleys of coolness, the slopes of the heat,
   With her blossomy traces;
Sweet month, with a mouth that is made of a rose,
   She lightens and lingers
In spots where the harp of the evening glows,
   Attuned by her fingers.

The stream from its home in the hollow hill slips
   In a darling old fashion;
And the day goeth down with a song on its lips
   Whose key-note is passion;
Far out in the fierce, bitter front of the sea
   I stand, and remember
Dead things that were brothers and sisters of thee,
   Resplendent September.

The West, when it blows at the fall of the noon
   And beats on the beaches,
Is filled with a tender and tremulous tune
   That touches and teaches;
The stories of Youth, of the burden of Time,
   And the death of Devotion,
Come back with the wind, and are themes of the rhyme
   In the waves of the ocean.

We, having a secret to others unknown,
   In the cool mountain-mosses,
May whisper together, September, alone
   Of our loves and our losses.
One word for her beauty, and one for the grace
   She gave to the hours;
And then we may kiss her, and suffer her face
   To sleep with the flowers.

Oh, season of changes -- of shadow and shine --
   September the splendid!
My song hath no music to mingle with thine,
   And its burden is ended;
But thou, being born of the winds and the sun,
   By mountain, by river,
Mayst lighten and listen, and loiter and run,
   With thy voices for ever.


Scheme AXAABBBB CXCDEBEB FGFGHIHI JDJDKGKG LDLDMBMB NONOGIGI
Poetic Form
Metre 11011101001 0011010 01010101101 001001 011011111010 1010010 1110101110 0010110 01001101101 110110 01011001101 10110 11101111101 110010 0110110101 011010 01111001011 0010110 00111101111 111110 11001101101 110010 11101001011 010010 01111101101 011010 11101001001 110010 01011101011 0011010 11101011101 0011010 11001011001 0011010 11001001001 110101010 11101001101 111010 01111001001 111010 1101101101 010010 11111011011 0110110 11101101001 110110 11001001001 1110110
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 1,828
Words 331
Sentences 11
Stanzas 6
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8
Lines Amount 48
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 226
Words per stanza (avg) 55
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

1:39 min read
114

Henry Kendall

Thomas Henry Kendall was a nineteenth-century Australian author and bush poet, who was particularly known for his poems and tales set in a natural environment setting. more…

All Henry Kendall poems | Henry Kendall Books

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