Analysis of The Green Singer

John Shaw Neilson 1872 (Penola, South Australia) – 1942 (Melbourne, Victoria)



ALL singers have shadows   
 That follow like fears,   
But I know a singer   
 Who never saw tears;   
A gay love—a green love—           
 Delightsome—divine:   
The Spring is that singer—   
 An old love of mine!   

All players have shadows,   
 And into the play           
Old sorrows will saunter—   
 Old sorrows will stay.   
But here is a player   
 Whose speech is divine:   
The Spring is that player—           
 An old love of mine!   

All singers grow heavy:   
 Their hours as they run   
Bite up all the blossoms,   
 Suck up all the sun;           
But I know a singer   
 Delightsome—divine:   
The gay love—the green love—   
 An old love of mine!


Scheme axBxcDbD aebebdbD xfxfBDcD
Poetic Form
Metre 11011 11011 111010 11011 011011 101 011110 11111 11011 00101 110110 11011 111010 11101 011110 11111 110110 110111 111010 11101 111010 101 011011 11111
Closest metre Iambic trimeter
Characters 673
Words 105
Sentences 5
Stanzas 3
Stanza Lengths 8, 8, 8
Lines Amount 24
Letters per line (avg) 18
Words per line (avg) 4
Letters per stanza (avg) 143
Words per stanza (avg) 34
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

31 sec read
42

John Shaw Neilson

John Shaw Neilson was an Australian poet. Slightly built, for most of his life he worked as a labourer, fruit-picking, clearing scrub, navvying and working in quarries, and, after 1928, working as a messenger with the Country Roads Board in Melbourne. he died when he was 70 years old. more…

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