Analysis of The Corn Song
John Greenleaf Whittier 1807 (Haverhill) – 1892 (Hampton Falls)
HEAP HIGH the farmer’s wintry hoard!
Heap high the golden corn!
No richer gift has Autumn poured
From out her lavish horn!
Let other lands, exulting, glean
The apple from the pine,
The orange from its glossy green,
The cluster from the vine;
We better love the hardy gift
Our rugged vales bestow,
To cheer us when the storm shall drift
Our harvest-fields with snow.
Through vales of grass and meads of flowers
Our ploughs their furrows made,
While on the hills the sun and showers
Of changeful April played.
We dropped the seed o’er hill and plain
Beneath the sun of May,
And frightened from our sprouting grain
The robber crows away.
All through the long, bright days of June
Its leaves grew green and fair,
And waved in hot midsummer’s noon
Its soft and yellow hair.
And now, with autumn’s moonlit eves,
Its harvest-time has come,
We pluck away the frosted leaves,
And bear the treasure home.
There, richer than the fabled gift
Apollo showered of old,
Fair hands the broken grain shall sift,
And knead its meal of gold.
Let vapid idlers loll in silk
Around their costly board;
Give us the bowl of samp and milk,
By homespun beauty poured!
Where’er the wide old kitchen hearth
Sends up its smoky curls,
Who will not thank the kindly earth
And bless our farmer girls?
Then shame on all the proud and vain,
Whose folly laughs to scorn
The blessing of our hardy grain,
Our wealth of golden corn!
Let earth withhold her goodly root,
Let mildew blight the rye,
Give to the worm the orchard’s fruit,
The wheat-field to the fly:
But let the good old crop adorn
The hills our fathers trod;
Still let us, for His golden corn,
Send up our thanks to God!
Scheme | ABABCDCD EFEF GHGH IJIJ KLKL MXMX ENEN OAOA XPXP IBIB QRQR BSBS |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 11010101 110101 11011101 110101 11010101 010101 01011101 010101 11010101 1010101 11110111 1010111 111101110 101111 110101010 11101 11011101 010111 010110101 010101 11011111 111101 010111 110101 011111 110111 11010101 010101 11010101 0101011 11010111 011111 1101101 011101 11011101 11101 1011101 111101 11110101 0110101 11110101 110111 010110101 1011101 11010101 11101 11010101 011101 11011101 0110101 11111101 1110111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,625 |
Words | 301 |
Sentences | 14 |
Stanzas | 12 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4 |
Lines Amount | 52 |
Letters per line (avg) | 25 |
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
- 1:30 min read
- 120 Views
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"The Corn Song" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 8 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/23073/the-corn-song>.
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