Analysis of Sepulchre
George Herbert 1593 (Montgomery) – 1633 (Bemerton)
O blessed body! Whither are thou thrown?
No lodging for thee, but a cold hard stone?
So many hearts on earth, and yet not one
Receive thee?
Sure there is room within our hearts' good store;
For they can lodge transgressions by the score:
Thousands of toys dwell there, yet out of door
They leave thee.
But that which shows them large, shows them unfit.
What ever sin did this pure rock commit,
Which holds thee now? Who hath indicted it
Of murder?
Where our hard hearts have took up stories to brain thee,
And missing this, most falsely did arraign thee,
And order.
And as of old, the law by heav'nly art
Was writ in stone; so thou, which also art
The letter of the word, find'st no fit heart
To hold thee.
Yet do we still persist as we began,
And so should perish, but that nothing can,
Though it be cold, hard, foul, from loving man
Withold thee.
Scheme | AABCDDDCEEEFCCFGGGCHHHC |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 111010111 1101110111 1101110111 011 11110110111 1111010101 1011111111 111 1111111101 1101111101 1111110101 110 1101111110111 01011101011 010 011101111 1101111101 01010111111 111 1111011101 0111011101 1111111101 11 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 848 |
Words | 163 |
Sentences | 12 |
Stanzas | 1 |
Stanza Lengths | 23 |
Lines Amount | 23 |
Letters per line (avg) | 28 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 654 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 163 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on April 08, 2023
- 49 sec read
- 145 Views
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"Sepulchre" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 11 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/15375/sepulchre>.
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