Analysis of The Winding Stair And Other Poems
William Butler Yeats 1865 (Sandymount) – 1939 (Menton)
IN MEMORY OF EVA GORE-BOOTH AND CON MARKIEWICZ
THE light of evening, Lissadell,
Great windows open to the south,
Two girls in silk kimonos, both
Beautiful, one a gazelle.
But a raving autumn shears
Blossom from the summer's wreath;
The older is condemned to death,
Pardoned, drags out lonely years
Conspiring among the ignorant.
I know not what the younger dreams --
Some vague Utopia -- and she seems,
When withered old and skeleton-gaunt,
An image of such politics.
Many a time I think to seek
One or the other out and speak
Of that old Georgian mansion, mix
pictures of the mind, recall
That table and the talk of youth,
Two girls in silk kimonos, both
Beautiful, one a gazelle.
Dear shadows, now you know it all,
All the folly of a fight
With a common wrong or right.
The innocent and the beautiful.
Have no enemy but time;
Arise and bid me strike a match
And strike another till time catch;
Should the conflagration climb,
Run till all the sages know.
We the great gazebo built,
They convicted us of guilt;
Bid me strike a match and blow.
Scheme | x axBAxxxxxccxdeedaxBAaffaghhgxiia |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 01001101101100 011101 11010101 11010101 1001001 1010101 1010101 01010111 1011101 010010100 11110101 110100011 110101001 1101110 10011111 11010101 11110101 101011 11000111 11010101 1001001 1111111 1010101 1010111 010000100 1110011 01011101 01010111 100101 1110101 10111 1010111 1110101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,019 |
Words | 192 |
Sentences | 9 |
Stanzas | 2 |
Stanza Lengths | 1, 32 |
Lines Amount | 33 |
Letters per line (avg) | 25 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 409 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 95 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 29, 2023
- 57 sec read
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