Analysis of Success
Henry Lawson 1867 (Grenfell) – 1922 (Sydney)
Did you see that man riding past,
With shoulders bowed with care?
There’s failure in his eyes to last,
And in his heart despair.
He seldom looks to left or right,
He nods, but speaks to none,
And he’s a man who fought the fight—
God knows how hard!—and won.
No great “review” could rouse him now,
No printed lies could sting;
No kindness smooth his knitted brow,
Nor wrong one new line bring.
Through dull, dumb days and brooding nights,
From years of storm and stress,
He’s riding down from lonely heights—
The Mountains of Success.
He sees across the darkening land
The graveyards on the coasts;
He sees the broken columns stand
Like cold and bitter ghosts;
His world is dead while yet he lives,
Though known in continents;
His camp is where his country gives
Its pauper monuments.
Scheme | ABABCDCDEFEFGHGH IJIJKLKL |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Traditional rhyme |
Metre | 11111101 110111 11001111 001101 11011111 111111 01011101 111101 1111111 110111 11011101 111111 11110101 111101 11011101 010101 110101001 01101 11010101 110101 11111111 110100 11111101 110100 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 786 |
Words | 144 |
Sentences | 8 |
Stanzas | 2 |
Stanza Lengths | 16, 8 |
Lines Amount | 24 |
Letters per line (avg) | 26 |
Words per line (avg) | 6 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 307 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 71 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 43 sec read
- 77 Views
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"Success" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 26 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/17927/success>.
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