Analysis of When Helen Lived
William Butler Yeats 1865 (Sandymount) – 1939 (Menton)
WE have cried in our despair
That men desert,
For some trivial affair
Or noisy, insolent sport,
Beauty that we have won
From bitterest hours;
Yet we, had we walked within
Those topless towers
Where Helen waked with her boy,
Had given but as the rest
Of the men and women of Troy,
A word and a jest.
Scheme | ABACDEFEGHGH |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11101001 1110 1110001 1101001 101111 110010 1111101 11010 1101101 1101101 10101011 01001 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 295 |
Words | 60 |
Sentences | 2 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 12 |
Lines Amount | 12 |
Letters per line (avg) | 19 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 233 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 58 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 13, 2023
- 18 sec read
- 122 Views
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"When Helen Lived" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 29 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/39622/when-helen-lived>.
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