Analysis of Sonnet XXXVI: Life-In-Love

Dante Gabriel Rossetti 1828 (London) – 1882 (Birchington-on-Sea)



Not in thy body is thy life at all,
But in this lady's lips and hands and eyes;
Through these she yields thee life that vivifies
What else were sorrow's servant and death's thrall.
Look on thyself without her, and recall
The waste remembrance and forlorn surmise
That lived but in a dead-drawn breath of sighs
O'er vanished hours and hours eventual.
Even so much life hath the poor tress of hair
Which, stored apart, is all love hath to show
For heart-beats and for fire-heats long ago;
Even so much life endures unknown, even where,
'Mid change the changeless night environeth,
Lies all that golden hair undimmed in death.


Scheme ABBAABBCDEEDFF
Poetic Form
Metre 1011011111 1011010101 11111111 110110011 11101001 0101000101 1110011111 1010100100100 10111101111 1101111111 11101101101 101110101101 110111 111101101
Closest metre Iambic pentameter
Characters 618
Words 112
Sentences 4
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 35
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 494
Words per stanza (avg) 110
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

34 sec read
26

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Dante Gabriel Rossetti was an English poet, illustrator, painter and translator. more…

All Dante Gabriel Rossetti poems | Dante Gabriel Rossetti Books

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