Analysis of The After-Glow

Coventry Patmore 1823 (Woodford, London) – 1896 (Lymington)



Suspicion's playful counterfeit
Begot your question strange:
The only thing that I forget
Is that there's any change.
Did that long blight which fell on you
My zeal of heart assuage?
Less willing shall I watch you through
The milder illness, age?
To my monopoly first blind
When risks no longer live,
And careless of the hand so kind
That has no more to give,
Shall I forget Spring like a tree,
Nor boast, ‘Her honied cup
Of beauty to his lips save me
No man has lifted up!’
Mine are not memories that come
Of joys that could not last:
They are; and you, Dear, are the sum
Of all your lovely past.
Yet if, with all this conscious weal,
I still should covet more,
The joy behind me shall reveal
The joy that waits before:
I'll mind from sickness how to life
You came, by tardy stealth,
Till, one spring day, I clasp'd my wife
Abloom with blandest health.


Scheme ABCBDEDEFGFHIJIJKLKLMNMNOPOP
Poetic Form
Metre 11010 011101 01011101 111101 11111111 111101 11011111 010101 11010011 111101 01010111 111111 11011101 11011 11011111 111101 11110011 111111 11011101 111101 11111101 111101 01011101 011101 11110111 111101 11111111 01111
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 838
Words 164
Sentences 7
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 28
Lines Amount 28
Letters per line (avg) 24
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 663
Words per stanza (avg) 161
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

50 sec read
86

Coventry Patmore

Coventry Kersey Dighton Patmore was an English poet and critic best known for The Angel in the House, his narrative poem about an ideal happy marriage. more…

All Coventry Patmore poems | Coventry Patmore Books

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