Analysis of A Day Of Sunshine. (Birds Of Passage. Flight The Second)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 1807 (Portland) – 1882 (Cambridge)



O gift of God! O perfect day:
Whereon shall no man work, but play;
Whereon it is enough for me,
Not to be doing, but to be!

Through every fibre of my brain,
Through every nerve, through every vein,
I feel the electric thrill, the touch
Of life, that seems almost too much.

I hear the wind among the trees
Playing celestial symphonies;
I see the branches downward bent,
Like keys of some great instrument.

And over me unrolls on high
The splendid scenery of the sky,
Where though a sapphire sea the sun
Sails like a golden galleon,

Towards yonder cloud-land in the West,
Towards yonder Islands of the Blest,
Whose steep sierra far uplifts
Its craggy summits white with drifts.

Blow, winds! and waft through all the rooms
The snow-flakes of the cherry-blooms!
Blow, winds! and bend within my reach
The fiery blossoms of the peach!

O Life and Love! O happy throng
Of thoughts, whose only speech is song!
O heart of man! canst thou not be
Blithe as the air is, and as free?


Scheme AABB CCDD EEXX FFGG HHEX IIJJ KKBB
Poetic Form Quatrain  (86%)
Metre 11111011 1111111 1110111 11110111 110010111 1100111001 110010101 1111111 11010101 10010100 11010101 11111100 0101111 010100101 110100101 11010100 011011001 011010101 1101011 11010111 11011101 01110101 11010111 010010101 11011101 11110111 11111111 11011011
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 956
Words 180
Sentences 14
Stanzas 7
Stanza Lengths 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4
Lines Amount 28
Letters per line (avg) 27
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 108
Words per stanza (avg) 25
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 05, 2023

54 sec read
80

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was an American poet and educator whose works include "Paul Revere's Ride", The Song of Hiawatha, and Evangeline. more…

All Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poems | Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Books

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    "A Day Of Sunshine. (Birds Of Passage. Flight The Second)" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 31 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/18489/a-day-of-sunshine.-%28birds-of-passage.-flight-the-second%29>.

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