Analysis of My Secret. (From The French Of Felix Arvers)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 1807 (Portland) – 1882 (Cambridge)



My soul its secret hath, my life too hath its mystery,
A love eternal in a moment's space conceived;
Hopeless the evil is, I have not told its history,
And she who was the cause nor knew it nor believed.
Alas! I shall have passed close by her unperceived,
For ever at her side and yet for ever lonely,
I shall unto the end have made life's journey, only
Daring to ask for nought, and having nought received.

For her, though God hath made her gentle and endearing,
She will go on her way distraught and without hearing
These murmurings of love that round her steps ascend,
Piously faithful still unto her austere duty,
Will say, when she shall read these lines full of her beauty,
Who can this woman be? and will not comprehend.


Scheme ABABBAAB CCDAAD
Poetic Form
Metre 11110111111100 010100010101 10010111111100 011101111101 0111111101 1101010111010 1110011111010 101111010101 1011110100010 1111010100110 1111110101 1001011000110 1111111111010 11110101101
Closest metre Iambic heptameter
Characters 722
Words 137
Sentences 6
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 8, 6
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 41
Words per line (avg) 10
Letters per stanza (avg) 286
Words per stanza (avg) 68
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

41 sec read
71

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an American poet and educator whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline. more…

All Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poems | Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Books

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