Analysis of My Psalm
John Greenleaf Whittier 1807 (Haverhill) – 1892 (Hampton Falls)
I mourn no more my vanished years
Beneath a tender rain,
An April rain of smiles and tears,
My heart is young again.
The west-winds blow, and, singing low,
I hear the glad streams run;
The windows of my soul I throw
Wide open to the sun.
No longer forward nor behind
I look in hope or fear;
But, grateful, take the good I find,
The best of now and here.
I plough no more a desert land,
To harvest weed and tare;
The manna dropping from God's hand
Rebukes my painful care.
I break my pilgrim staff, I lay
Aside the toiling oar;
The angel sought so far away
I welcome at my door.
The airs of spring may never play
Among the ripening corn,
Nor freshness of the flowers of May
Blow through the autumn morn.
Yet shall the blue-eyed gentian look
Through fringed lids to heaven,
And the pale aster in the brook
Shall see its image given;--
The woods shall wear their robes of praise,
The south-wind softly sigh,
And sweet, calm days in golden haze
Melt down the amber sky.
Not less shall manly deed and word
Rebuke an age of wrong;
The graven flowers that wreathe the sword
Make not the blade less strong.
But smiting hands shall learn to heal,--
To build as to destroy;
Nor less my heart for others feel
That I the more enjoy.
All as God wills, who wisely heeds
To give or to withhold,
And knoweth more of all my needs
Than all my prayers have told.
Enough that blessings undeserved
Have marked my erring track;
That wheresoe'er my feet have swerved,
His chastening turned me back;
That more and more a Providence
Of love is understood,
Making the springs of time and sense
Sweet with eternal good;--
That death seems but a covered way
Which opens into light,
Wherein no blinded child can stray
Beyond the Father's sight;
That care and trial seem at last,
Through Memory's sunset air,
Like mountain-ranges overpast,
In purple distance fair;
That all the jarring notes of life
Seem blending in a psalm,
And all the angles of its strife
Slow rounding into calm.
And so the shadows fall apart,
And so the west-winds play;
And all the windows of my heart
I open to the day.
Scheme | XXXX ABAB CDCX EDEF GHGH GIGI JBJB KLKL XMXM NONO PQPQ RSRS XTXT GUGU XFCF VXVX WGWG |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain (82%) |
Metre | 11111101 010101 11011101 111101 01110101 110111 01011111 110101 11010101 110111 11010111 011101 11110101 110101 01010111 011101 11110111 010101 01011101 110111 01111101 0101001 110101011 110101 11011101 111110 00110001 1111010 01111111 011101 01110101 110101 11110101 011111 010101101 110111 1111111 111101 11111101 110101 11111101 111101 0111111 111111 0111001 111101 111111 11111 11010100 11101 10011101 110101 11110101 110011 01110111 010101 11010111 1111 110101 010101 11010111 110001 01010111 110011 0101101 010111 01010111 110101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 2,004 |
Words | 390 |
Sentences | 13 |
Stanzas | 17 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 68 |
Letters per line (avg) | 24 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 95 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 23 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 23, 2023
- 1:58 min read
- 202 Views
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"My Psalm" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/22985/my-psalm>.
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