Analysis of Sorrows of the Moon

Charles Baudelaire 1821 (Paris) – 1867 (Paris)



Tonight the moon dreams in a deeper languidness,
And, like a beauty on her cushions, lies at rest;
While drifting off to sleep, a tentative caress
Seeks, with a gentle hand, the contour of her breast;

As on a crest above her silken avalanche,
Dying, she yields herself to an unending swoon,
And sees a pallid vision everywhere she’d glance,
In the azure sky where blossoms have been strewn.

When sometime, in her weariness, upon her sphere
She might permit herself to sheda furtive tear,
A poet of great piety, a foe of sleep,

Catches in the hollow of his hand that tear,
An opal fragment, iridescent as a star;
Within his heart, far from the sun, it’s buried deep.


Scheme ABAB XCAC XDE DXE
Poetic Form
Metre 0101100101 010101010111 110111010001 11010101101 11010101010 101101110101 01010101011 00101110111 11001000101 11010111101 010111000111 10001011111 11010010101 011111011101
Closest metre Iambic hexameter
Characters 664
Words 122
Sentences 3
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 3, 3
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 37
Words per line (avg) 9
Letters per stanza (avg) 130
Words per stanza (avg) 30
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on May 02, 2023

36 sec read
171

Charles Baudelaire

Charles Pierre Baudelaire was a French poet who also produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. more…

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