Analysis of Despair

Mathilde Blind 1841 (Mannheim) – 1896 (London)



Thy wings swoop darkening round my soul, Despair!
And on my brain thy shadow seems to brood
And hem me round with stifling solitude,
With chasms of vacuous bloom which are thy lair.
No light of human joy, no song or prayer,
Breaks ever on this chaos, all imbrued
With heart's-blood trickling from the multitude
Of sweet hopes slain, or agonising there.

Lo, wilt thou yield thyself to grief, and roll
Vanquished from thy high seat, imperial brain,
And abdicating turbulent life's control,
Be dragged a captive bound in sorrow's chain?
Nay! though my heart is breaking with its pain,
No pain on earth has power to crush my soul.


Scheme ABBAABBA CDCDDC
Poetic Form
Metre 11110011101 011111111 011111010 11110011111 1111011111 110111011 111101010 1111111 111111101 10111101001 0100100101 110101011 1111110111 11111101111
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 634
Words 112
Sentences 7
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 8, 6
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 35
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 248
Words per stanza (avg) 55
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

34 sec read
92

Mathilde Blind

Mathilde Blind, was a German-born British poet. Her work was praised by Matthew Arnold and French politician and historian Louis Blanc. more…

All Mathilde Blind poems | Mathilde Blind Books

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