Analysis of Give Me The Splendid, Silent Sun
GIVE me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full-dazzling;
Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the orchard;
Give me a field where the unmow'd grass grows;
Give me an arbor, give me the trellis'd grape;
Give me fresh corn and wheat--give me serene-moving animals, teaching
content;
Give me nights perfectly quiet, as on high plateaus west of the
Mississippi, and I looking up at the stars;
Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers, where I can
walk undisturb'd;
Give me for marriage a sweet-breath'd woman, of whom I should never
tire;
Give me a perfect child--give me, away, aside from the noise of the
world, a rural, domestic life;
Give me to warble spontaneous songs, reliev'd, recluse by myself, for
my own ears only; 10
Give me solitude--give me Nature--give me again, O Nature, your
primal sanities!
--These, demanding to have them, (tired with ceaseless excitement,
and rack'd by the war-strife;)
These to procure, incessantly asking, rising in cries from my heart,
While yet incessantly asking, still I adhere to my city;
Day upon day, and year upon year, O city, walking your streets,
Where you hold me enchain'd a certain time, refusing to give me up;
Yet giving to make me glutted, enrich'd of soul--you give me forever
faces;
(O I see what I sought to escape, confronting, reversing my cries;
I see my own soul trampling down what it ask'd for.)
Keep your splendid, silent sun; 20
Keep your woods, O Nature, and the quiet places by the woods;
Keep your fields of clover and timothy, and your corn-fields and
orchards;
Keep the blossoming buckwheat fields, where the Ninth-month bees hum;
Give me faces and streets! give me these phantoms incessant and
endless along the trottoirs!
Give me interminable eyes! give me women! give me comrades and lovers
by the thousand!
Let me see new ones every day! let me hold new ones by the hand every
day!
Give me such shows! give me the streets of Manhattan!
Give me Broadway, with the soldiers marching--give me the sound of
the trumpets and drums!
(The soldiers in companies or regiments--some, starting away, flush'd
and reckless;
Some, their time up, returning, with thinn'd ranks--young, yet very
old, worn, marching, noticing nothing;) 30
--Give me the shores and the wharves heavy-fringed with the black
ships!
O such for me! O an intense life! O full to repletion, and varied!
The life of the theatre, bar-room, huge hotel, for me!
The saloon of the steamer! the crowded excursion for me! the torch-
light procession!
The dense brigade, bound for the war, with high piled military wagons
following;
People, endless, streaming, with strong voices, passions, pageants;
Manhattan streets, with their powerful throbs, with the beating
drums, as now;
The endless and noisy chorus, the rustle and clank of muskets, (even
the sight of the wounded;)
Manhattan crowds, with their turbulent musical chorus--with varied
chorus, and light of the sparkling eyes;
Manhattan faces and eyes forever for me. 40
Scheme | AXBXAXCXXXDDCEFGFBXEXGXXDXHF IXJXXJBXJGXIXXXXGAXXKGXIXAXAXXXKHG |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1101010111111100 111001011011010 110110111 1111011011 11110111011010010 10 111100101111110 01001101101 1110011010110010111 101 1111001110111110 10 11001111010110110 10100101 11110010010101111 11110 1110111011011101 101 101011110110010 011011 11010100101001111 1101001011011110 1011010111101011 1111101010101111 110111100111111010 10 11111110101001011 111111011111 1110101 111110001010101 111110010001110 10 1010011101111 111001111100100 100101 110100011110111010 1010 11111100111111101100 1 111111011010 11110101011011 01001 01001001100110011 010 11110101111110 111010010 1101001101101 1 1111110111111010 01101001110111 00110100100101101 1010 0101110111110010 100 10101011101010 01011110011010 111 01001010010011110 011010 01011110010010110 100110101 010100101011 |
Closest metre | Iambic hexameter |
Characters | 3,377 |
Words | 509 |
Sentences | 22 |
Stanzas | 2 |
Stanza Lengths | 28, 34 |
Lines Amount | 62 |
Letters per line (avg) | 37 |
Words per line (avg) | 10 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 1,162 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 314 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 03, 2023
- 2:36 min read
- 293 Views
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"Give Me The Splendid, Silent Sun" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 1 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/38018/give-me-the-splendid%2C-silent-sun>.
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