Analysis of The Mother
Nettie Palmer 1885 (Bendigo) – 1964 (Hawthorn)
IN the sorrow and the terror of the nations,
In a world shaken through by lamentations,
Shall I dare know happiness
That I stitch a baby’s dress?
So: for I shall be a mother with the mothers,
I shall know the mother’s anguish like the others,
Present joy must surely start
For the life beneath my heart.
Gods and men, ye know a woman’s glad unreason,
How she cannot bend and weep but in her season,
Let my hours with rapture glow
As the seams and stitches grow.
And I cannot hear the word of fire and slaughter;
Do men die? Then live, my child, my son, my daughter!
Into realms of pain I bring
You for joy’s own offering.
Scheme | AAXX BBCC DDEE FFGG |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 001000101010 00110111 1111100 111011 111110101010 111010101010 1011101 1010111 101110111 111010110010 11101101 1010101 0110101110010 111111111110 0111111 1111100 |
Closest metre | Iambic pentameter |
Characters | 711 |
Words | 122 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 16 |
Letters per line (avg) | 30 |
Words per line (avg) | 8 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 120 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 30 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 36 sec read
- 114 Views
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