Analysis of The Memory Of Burns
John Greenleaf Whittier 1807 (Haverhill) – 1892 (Hampton Falls)
How sweetly come the holy psalms
From saints and martyrs down,
The waving of triumphal palms
Above the thorny crown
The choral praise, the chanted prayers
From harps by angels strung,
The hunted Cameron's mountain airs,
The hymns that Luther sung!
Yet, jarring not the heavenly notes,
The sounds of earth are heard,
As through the open minster floats
The song of breeze and bird
Not less the wonder of the sky
That daisies bloom below;
The brook sings on, though loud and high
The cloudy organs blow!
And, if the tender ear be jarred
That, haply, hears by turns
The saintly harp of Olney's bard,
The pastoral pipe of Burns,
No discord mars His perfect plan
Who gave them both a tongue;
For he who sings the love of man
The love of God hath sung!
To-day be every fault forgiven
Of him in whom we joy
We take, with thanks, the gold of Heaven
And leave the earth's alloy.
Be ours his music as of spring,
His sweetness as of flowers,
The songs the bard himself might sing
In holier ears than ours.
Sweet airs of love and home, the hum
Of household melodies,
Come singing, as the robins come
To sing in door-yard trees.
And, heart to heart, two nations lean,
No rival wreaths to twine,
But blending in eternal green
The holly and the pine!
Scheme | XAXABCBC DEDEFGFG HIHIJCJC KLKLMNMN OPOPQRQR |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Etheree (30%) Tetractys (23%) |
Metre | 11010101 110101 01010101 010101 01010101 111101 010100101 011101 110101001 011111 11010101 011101 11010101 110101 01111101 010101 01010111 11111 0101111 0100111 11011011 111101 11110111 011111 1111001010 110111 111101110 01011 110110111 1101110 01010111 01001110 11110101 11100 11010101 110111 01111101 110111 11000101 010001 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,203 |
Words | 231 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 8, 8, 8, 8, 8 |
Lines Amount | 40 |
Letters per line (avg) | 24 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 194 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 46 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:10 min read
- 74 Views
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"The Memory Of Burns" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/23143/the-memory-of-burns>.
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