Analysis of Dedication - Songs of Labor
John Greenleaf Whittier 1807 (Haverhill) – 1892 (Hampton Falls)
I WOULD the gift I offer here
Might graces from thy favor take,
And, seen through Friendship's atmosphere,
On softened lines and coloring, wear
The unaccustomed light of beauty, for thy sake.
Few leaves of Fancy's spring remain:
But what I have I give to thee,
The o'er-sunned bloom of summer's plain,
And paler flowers, the latter rain
Calls from the westering slope of life's autumnal lea.
Above the fallen groves of green,
Where youth's enchanted forest stood,
Dry root and mossëd trunk between,
A sober after-growth is seen,
As springs the pine where falls the gay-leafed maple wood!
Yet birds will sing, and breezes play
Their leaf-harps in the sombre tree;
And through the bleak and wintry day
It keeps its steady green alway, —
So, even my after-thoughts may have a charm for thee.
Art's perfect forms no moral need,
And beauty is its own excuse;
But for the dull and flowerless weed
Some healing virtue still must plead,
And the rough ore must find its honors in its use.
So haply these, my simple lays
Of homely toil, may serve to show
The orchard bloom and tasselled maize
That skirt and gladden duty's ways,
The unsung beauty hid life's common things below.
Haply from them the toiler, bent
Above his forge or plough, may gain,
A manlier spirit of content,
And feel that life is wisest spent
Where the strong working hand makes strong the working brain.
The doom which to the guilty pair
Without the walls of Eden came,
Transforming sinless ease to care
And rugged toil, no more shall bear
The burden of old crime, or mark of primal shame.
A blessing now, a curse no more;
Since He, whose name we breathe with awe,
The coarse mechanic vesture wore,
A poor man toiling with the poor,
In labor, as in prayer, fulfilling the same law.
Scheme | ABCDBEFEEFGHGGHIFIJFKLKKLMNMMNOEOOEDPDDPQJQRS |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11011101 11011101 011110 110101001 00101110111 1111101 11111111 010111101 01100101 11011110101 01010111 11010101 11011101 01010111 110111011101 11110101 1110011 01010101 1111011 1101101110111 10111101 01011101 1101011 11010111 001111110011 1111101 11011111 0101011 1101011 001101110101 111011 01111111 0110110 01111101 101101110101 01110101 01011101 0101111 01011111 010111111101 01010111 11111111 0101011 01110101 010101010011 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,709 |
Words | 313 |
Sentences | 10 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 45 |
Lines Amount | 45 |
Letters per line (avg) | 30 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 1,369 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 311 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:36 min read
- 134 Views
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