Analysis of A Spring Carol
Alfred Austin 1835 (Leeds) – 1913 (Ashford)
I
Blithe friend! blithe throstle! Is it thou,
Whom I at last again hear sing,
Perched on thy old accustomed bough,
Poet-prophet of the Spring?
Yes! Singing as thou oft hast sung,
I can see thee there among
The clustered branches of my leafless oak;
Where, thy plumage gray as it,
Thou mightst unsuspected sit,
Didst thou not thyself betray
With thy penetrating lay,
Swelling thy mottled breast at each triumphant stroke.
Wherefore warble half concealed,
When thy notes are shaft and shield,
And no hand that lives would slay
Singer of such a roundelay?
Telling of thy presence thus,
Be nor coy nor timorous!
Sing loud! Sing long!
And let thy song
Usurp the air 'twixt earth and sky:
Let it soar and sink and rally,
Ripple low along the valley,
Break against the fir-trees high,
Ofttimes pausing, never dying,
While we lean where fancy bids,
Listening, with half-closèd lids,
Unto the self-same chant, most sweet, most satisfying.
II
Where hast thou been all the dumb winter days,
When neither sunlight was nor smile of flowers,
Neither life, nor love, nor frolic,
Only expanse melancholic,
With never a note of thy exhilarating lays?
But, instead, the raven's croak,
Sluggish dawns and draggled hours,
Gusts morose and callous showers,
Underneath whose cutting stroke
Huddle the seasoned kine, and even the robin cowers.
Wast thou asleep in some snug hollow
Of my hybernating oak,
Through the dripping weeks that follow
One another slow, and soak
Summer's extinguished fire and autumn's drifting smoke?
Did its waking awake thee,
Or thou it with melody?
Or together did ye both
Start from winter's sleep and sloth,
And the self-same sap that woke
Bole and branch, and sets them budding,
Is thy throat with rapture flooding?
Or, avoiding icy yoke,
When golden leaves floated on silver meres,
And pensive Autumn, keeping back her tears,
Nursed waning Summer in her quiet lap,
Didst thou timely pinions flap,
Fleeing from a land of loss,
And, with happy mates, across
Ocean's restless ridges travel,
To that lemon-scented shore
Where, beneath a deep-domed sky,
Carven of lapis-lazuli,
Golden sunlight evermore
Glistens against golden gravel,
Nor ever a snowflake falls, nor rain-clouds wheel and ravel;
Clime where I wandered once among
Ruins old with feelings young,
Whither too I count to fly
When my songful seasons die,
And with the self-same spell which, first when mine,
Intensified my youth, to temper my decline.
III
Wherefore dost thou sing, and sing?
Is it for sheer joy of singing?
Is it to hasten lagging Spring,
Or greet the Lenten lilies through turf and turf upspringing?
Dost thou sing to earth or sky?
Never comes but one reply:
Carol faint, carol high,
Ringing, ringing, ringing!
Are those iterated trills
For the down-looking daffodils,
That have strained and split their sheath,
And are listening underneath?
Or but music's prompting note,
Whereunto the lambs may skip?
Haply dost thou swell thy throat,
Only to show thy craftsmanship?
Wouldst thou pipe if none should hearken?
If the sky should droop and darken,
And, as came the hills more close,
Moody March to wooing Spring
Sudden turned a mouth morose,-
Unheeded wouldst, unheeding, sing?
What is it rules thy singing season?
Instinct, that diviner reason,
To which the thirst to know seemeth a sort of treason?
If it be,
Enough for me,
And any motive for thy music I
Will not ask thee to impart,
Letting my head play traitor to my heart,
Too deeply questioning why.
Sing for nothing, if thou wilt,
Or, if thou for aught must sing,
Sing unto thy anxious spouse,
Sitting somewhere 'mong the boughs,
In the nest that thou hast built,
Underneath her close-furled wing
Future carols fostering.
Sing, because it is thy bent;
Sing, to heighten thy content!
Sing, for secret none can guess;
Sing for very uselessness!
Sing for love of love and pleasure,
Unborn joy, unfound treasure,
Rapture no words can reach, yearning no thoughts can measure!
IV
Why dost thou ever cease to sing?
Singing is such sweet comfort, who,
If he could sing the whole year through,
Would barter it for anything?
Why do not thou and joy their reign assert
Over winter, death, and hurt?
If thou forcest them to flee,
They in turn will banish thee,
Making life betwixt ye thus
Mutably monotonous.
O, why dost thou not perch and pipe perpetually?
All the answer I do get,
Is louder, madde
Scheme | ABCBCDDEFFGGEHHGIJJKKAIIACLLC AMNOOMENNEJIEIEEPPQQECCEJXRRSSITAITIIDDAAUU ACCCCAAACJXVVWXWXUYZCZCYYYPPA1 1 A2 CXX2 CC3 3 XJ4 4 4 XC5 5 C6 6 IPJJIXF |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1 1111111 11110111 11110101 1010101 11011111 1111101 0101011101 1110111 110101 111101 111001 101101110101 110101 1111101 0111111 101101 1011101 1111100 1111 0111 1011101 11101010 10101010 1010111 1101010 1111101 10011111 100111111100 1 1111101101 1101111110 10111110 1001010 110011101001 101011 1010110 10101010 011101 1001010100101 110101110 1111 10101110 1010101 1001010010101 1110011 1111100 1010111 1110101 0011111 10101110 11111010 1010101 1101101101 0101010101 1101000101 111011 1010111 0110101 10101010 1110101 1010111 1110010 10110 1011010 1100111111010 11110101 1011101 1011111 111101 0101111111 01011110101 1 111101 11111110 11110101 11011011011 1111111 1011101 101101 101010 1111 1011010 1110111 0110001 1110101 10111 111111 1011110 1111111 10111010 0110111 1011101 1010101 010111 111111010 101110 110111101110 111 0111 0101011101 1111101 1011110111 1101001 1110111 1111111 1101101 101101 0011111 010111 1010100 1011111 1110110 1110111 11101 11111010 111110 1011111011110 1 11110111 10111101 11110111 1101110 1111011101 1010101 111111 1011101 1010111 10100 1111110101000 1010111 1101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 4,197 |
Words | 738 |
Sentences | 39 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 29, 43, 46, 14 |
Lines Amount | 132 |
Letters per line (avg) | 26 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 855 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 184 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 17, 2023
- 3:43 min read
- 43 Views
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"A Spring Carol" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 18 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/655/a-spring-carol>.
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