Armies in the Fire
Robert Louis Stevenson 1850 (Edinburgh) – 1894 (Vailima, Samoa)
The lamps now glitter down the street;
Faintly sound the falling feet;
And the blue even slowly falls
About the garden trees and walls.
Now in the falling of the gloom
The red fire paints the empty room:
And warmly on the roof it looks,
And flickers on the back of books.
Armies march by tower and spire
Of cities blazing, in the fire;--
Till as I gaze with staring eyes,
The armies fall, the lustre dies.
Then once again the glow returns;
Again the phantom city burns;
And down the red-hot valley, lo!
The phantom armies marching go!
Blinking embers, tell me true
Where are those armies marching to,
And what the burning city is
That crumbles in your furnaces!
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 37 sec read
- 162 Views
Quick analysis:
Scheme | AABB CCDD EEFF GGHH IIJJ |
---|---|
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 669 |
Words | 124 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
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"Armies in the Fire" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 20 Sep. 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem/31546/armies-in-the-fire>.
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