Analysis of A Fable
Dinah Maria Mulock Craik 1826 (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire) – 1887 (Shortlands, London)
SILENT and sunny was the way
Where Youth and I danced on together:
So winding and embowered o'er,
We could not see one rood before.
Nevertheless all merrily
We bounded onward, Youth and I,
Leashed closely in a silken tether:
(Well-a-day, well-a-day!)
Ah Youth, ah Youth, but I would fain
See thy sweet foolish face again!
It came to pass, one morn of May,
All in a swoon of golden weather,
That I through green leaves fluttering
Saw Joy uprise on Psyche wing:
Eagerly, too eagerly
We followed after,--Youth and I,--
Till suddenly he slipped the tether:
(Well-a-day, well-a-day!)
'Where art thou, Youth?' I cried. In vain;
He never more came back again.
Yet onward through the devious way
In rain or shine, I recked not whether,
Like many other maddened boy
I tracked my Psyche-wingèd Joy;
Till, curving round the bowery lane,
Lo,--in the pathway stood pale Pain,
And we met face to face together:
(Well-a-day, well-a-day!)
'Whence comest thou?'--and I writhed in vain--
'Unloose thy cruel grasp, O Pain!'
But he would not. Since, day by day
He has ta'en up Youth's silken tether
And changed it into iron bands.
So through rich vales and barren lands
Solemnly, all solemnly,
March we united, he and I;
And we have grown such friends together
(Well-a-day, well-a-day!)
I and this my brother Pain,
I think we'll never part again.
Scheme | abbxcdbAef abggcdbAef abhheebAee abiicdbAef |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 10010101 110111010 1100110 11111101 0011100 11010101 110001010 101101 11111111 11110101 11111111 100111010 11111100 11101101 1001100 11010101 110011010 101101 11111101 11011101 110101001 011111110 1101011 11110111 110101001 1001111 011111010 101101 11101101 1110111 11111111 1111111010 01101101 11110101 1001100 11010101 011111010 101101 1011101 11110101 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,335 |
Words | 241 |
Sentences | 15 |
Stanzas | 4 |
Stanza Lengths | 10, 10, 10, 10 |
Lines Amount | 40 |
Letters per line (avg) | 25 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 251 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 57 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:12 min read
- 39 Views
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"A Fable" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 27 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/7965/a-fable>.
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