Analysis of An ode to a Trilobite

Royston 1946 (Reading)



Swimming in profusion in the Cambrian sea
this lovely creature is so appealing to me.
It's a fossil of variety and surprise
with its simple three lobed shape and its compound eyes.

On its primordial feet it scurried around
the ocean floor hunting for food to be found.
Whenever threatened, it would curl into a ball
like a modern cheese hog to escape from it all.

This pioneer from the dawn of Earth's history
found its niche in the waters of the early sea.
From the primeval ooze across the years of time
adapting slowly to each changing clime.

Could the modern King Crab a distant relative be
of this lovely Trilobite from the Cambrian Sea?
It had passed on its genes o'er the aeons long
transforming and evolving as it went along.


Scheme AABB CCDD AAEE AAFF
Poetic Form Quatrain 
Metre 100010001001 110101101011 101010100001 111011101101 110100111001 01011011111 010101110101 101011101111 10110111100 111001010101 100101010111 0101011101 1010110101001 11101101001 11111110011 010001011101
Closest metre Iambic hexameter
Characters 733
Words 133
Sentences 8
Stanzas 4
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 16
Letters per line (avg) 37
Words per line (avg) 8
Letters per stanza (avg) 147
Words per stanza (avg) 33
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Submitted by royston on May 07, 2021

Modified on March 05, 2023

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