Analysis of The Empty Victory
Years have passed by
And empires rise and fall
Hope driven by our anger
As we push our enemies to the wall
Nine days and nights
The fight rages on
Never hearing an enemy speak
Just pulling the trigger until they're gone
No one pretends to enjoy it
No one pretends they're right
No one wants to be here
And yet we still fight
Nine more days, nine more nights
Embedded to our minds
Still the enemy comes at us
Crashing at our lines
And when the fighting finally stops
And the smoke settles on the ground
We walk up to our slaughtered foe
And glimpse what we have found
The body limp and small
The blood pool surrounded
A child struck in combat
As our troops are confounded
The war we fought for valor
The lives we took in haste
Weren't worth the loss of humanity
Or the blows to the human race
No one will walk away from this
Without a thought of regret
Our enemy fought and died
And no one is better for it
So as we start their graves
To give them their proper lay
The radio sparks up
And we can hear our commanders say
"You've all done well out there"
"To claim this land in our name"
"But more of you is needed"
"Before we can end this campaign"
"So grab up your rifles men"
"And never look back"
"For what happened on this day today"
"Is not part of the next attack"
We stand there for a moment
Listening to them speak
They never know what to say
Not wanting to look weak
And finally we turn it off
Realizing neither side has won
Not one man picked up his rifle
We're all in prayer for what we've done
Scheme | Text too long |
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Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111 0100101 11011010 11110100101 1101 01101 101011001 1100100111 11011011 110111 111111 01111 111111 0101101 10100111 101101 010101001 00110101 111110101 011111 010101 011010 011010 11011010 0111110 011101 1010110100 10110101 11110111 0101101 10100101 01111011 111111 1111101 01011 0111100101 111111 11110101 1111110 01111101 1111101 01011 111011101 11110101 1111010 100111 1101111 110111 01001111 10010111 11111110 11011111 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,452 |
Words | 297 |
Sentences | 1 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 52 |
Lines Amount | 52 |
Letters per line (avg) | 23 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 1,184 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 297 |
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Submitted on May 01, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 1:30 min read
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"The Empty Victory" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 28 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/86585/the-empty-victory>.
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