Analysis of On The Night Train
Henry Lawson 1867 (Grenfell) – 1922 (Sydney)
Have you seen the bush by moonlight, from the train, go running by?
Blackened log and stump and sapling, ghostly trees all dead and dry;
Here a patch of glassy water; there a glimpse of mystic sky?
Have you heard the still voice calling – yet so warm, and yet so cold:
"I'm the Mother-Bush that bore you! Come to me when you are old"?
Did you see the Bush below you sweeping darkly to the Range,
All unchanged and all unchanging, yet so very old and strange!
While you thought in softened anger of the things that did estrange?
(Did you hear the Bush a-calling, when your heart was young and bold:
"I'm the Mother-bush that nursed you; Come to me when you are old"?)
In the cutting or the tunnel, out of sight of stock or shed,
Did you hear the grey Bush calling from the pine-ridge overhead:
"You have seen the seas and cities – all is cold to you, or dead –
All seems done and all seems told, but the grey-light turns to gold!
I'm the Mother-Bush that loves you – come to me now you are old"?
Scheme | AAABB CCCBB DDDBB |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11101111011101 101010101011101 101110101011101 111011101110111 101011111111111 111010111010101 101010101110101 111010101011101 111010101111101 101011111111111 001010101111111 111011101011101 111010101111111 11101111011111 101011111111111 |
Closest metre | Iambic heptameter |
Characters | 1,010 |
Words | 196 |
Sentences | 10 |
Stanzas | 3 |
Stanza Lengths | 5, 5, 5 |
Lines Amount | 15 |
Letters per line (avg) | 50 |
Words per line (avg) | 13 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 252 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 64 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 02, 2023
- 59 sec read
- 90 Views
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"On The Night Train" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/17874/on-the-night-train>.
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