Analysis of Armies in the Fire
Robert Louis Stevenson 1850 (Edinburgh) – 1894 (Vailima, Samoa)
The lamps now glitter down the street;
Faintly sound the falling feet;
And the blue even slowly falls
About the garden trees and walls.
Now in the falling of the gloom
The red fire paints the empty room:
And warmly on the roof it looks,
And flickers on the back of books.
Armies march by tower and spire
Of cities blazing, in the fire;--
Till as I gaze with staring eyes,
The armies fall, the lustre dies.
Then once again the glow returns;
Again the phantom city burns;
And down the red-hot valley, lo!
The phantom armies marching go!
Blinking embers, tell me true
Where are those armies marching to,
And what the burning city is
That crumbles in your furnaces!
Scheme | AABB CCDD XXEE FFGG HHII |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Quatrain (80%) Etheree (25%) Tetractys (20%) |
Metre | 01110101 1010101 00110101 01010101 10010101 011010101 01010111 01010111 10111001 110100010 11111101 01010101 11010101 01010101 01011101 01010101 1010111 11110101 01010101 1100110 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 669 |
Words | 124 |
Sentences | 7 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 20 |
Letters per line (avg) | 26 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 104 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 24 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 37 sec read
- 159 Views
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"Armies in the Fire" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/31546/armies-in-the-fire>.
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