Analysis of A Psalm For New Year’s Eve
Dinah Maria Mulock Craik 1826 (Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire) – 1887 (Shortlands, London)
A FRIEND stands at the door;
In either tight-closed hand
Hiding rich gifts, three hundred and three score:
Waiting to strew them daily o'er the land
Even as seed the sower.
Each drops he, treads it in and passes by:
It cannot be made fruitful till it die.
O good New Year, we clasp
This warm shut hand of thine,
Loosing forever, with half sigh, half gasp,
That which from ours falls like dead fingers' twine:
Ay, whether fierce its grasp
Has been, or gentle, having been, we know
That it was blessed: let the Old Year go.
O New Year, teach us faith!
The road of life is hard:
When our feet bleed and scourging winds us scathe,
Point thou to Him whose visage was more marred
Than any man's: who saith
'Make straight paths for your feet'--and to the opprest--
'Come ye to Me, and I will give you rest.'
Yet hang some lamp-like hope
Above this unknown way,
Kind year, to give our spirits freer scope
And our hands strength to work while it is day.
But if that way must slope
Tombward, O bring before our fading eyes
The lamp of life, the Hope that never dies.
Comfort our souls with love,--
Love of all human kind;
Love special, close--in which like sheltered dove
Each weary heart its own safe nest may find;
And love that turns above
Adoringly; contented to resign
All loves, if need be, for the Love Divine.
Friend, come thou like a friend,
And whether bright thy face,
Or dim with clouds we cannot comprehend,--
We'll hold out patient hands, each in his place,
And trust thee to the end.
Knowing thou leadest onwards to those spheres
Where there are neither days nor months nor years.
Scheme | ABABXCC DEDEDFF GHGHGBX IJIJIKK LMLMLEE NONONPP |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 011101 010111 1011110011 10111101001 1011010 1111100101 1101110111 111111 111111 1001011111 11110111101 110111 1111010111 111110111 111111 011111 11011010111 1111110111 110111 1111110101 1111011111 111111 011011 11111010101 01011111111 111111 1110110101 0111011101 1010111 111101 1101011101 1101111111 011101 1010101 1111110101 111101 010111 111111001 1111011011 011101 101110111 1111011111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,593 |
Words | 299 |
Sentences | 11 |
Stanzas | 6 |
Stanza Lengths | 7, 7, 7, 7, 7, 7 |
Lines Amount | 42 |
Letters per line (avg) | 29 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 204 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 49 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 06, 2023
- 1:30 min read
- 112 Views
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"A Psalm For New Year’s Eve" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 Apr. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/7974/a-psalm-for-new-year%E2%80%99s-eve>.
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