Analysis of My Library
Like prim Professor of a College
I primed my shelves with books of knowledge;
And now I stand before them dumb,
Just like a child that sucks its thumb,
And stares forlorn and turns away,
With dolls or painted bricks to play.
They glour at me, my tomes of learning.
"You dolt!" they jibe; "you undiscerning
Moronic oaf, you make a fuss,
With highbrow swank selecting us;
Saying: "I'll read you all some day' -
And now you yawn and turn away.
"Unwanted wait we with our store
Of facts and philosophic lore;
The scholarship of all the ages
Snug packed within our uncut pages;
The mystery of all mankind
In part revealed - but you are blind.
"You have no time to read, you tell us;
Oh, do not think that we are jealous
Of all the trash that wins your favour,
The flimsy fiction that you savour:
We only beg that sometimes you
Will spare us just an hour or two.
"For all the minds that went to make us
Are dust if folk like you forsake us,
And they can only live again
By virtue of your kindling brain;
In magice print they packed their best:
Come - try their wisdom to digest. . . ."
Said I: "Alas! I am not able;
I lay my cards upon the table,
And with deep shame and blame avow
I am too old to read you now;
So I will lock you in glass cases
And shun your sad, reproachful faces."
* * * * * * * * *
My library is noble planned,
Yet in it desolate I stand;
And though my thousand books I prize,
Feeling a witling in their eyes,
I turn from them in weariness
To wallow in the Daily Press.
For, oh, I never, never will
The noble field of knowledge till:
I pattern words with artful tricks,
As children play with painted bricks,
And realize with futile woe,
Nothing I know - nor want to know.
My library has windowed nooks;
And so I turn from arid books
To vastitude of sea and sky,
And like a child content am I
With peak and plain and brook and tree,
Crying: "Behold! the books for me:
Nature, be thou my Library!"
Scheme | XXAABB CCDDBB EEFFGG DDEEHH DDXXII JJKKFF LLMMDX NNOOPP QQRRSSS |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 110101010 111111110 01110111 11011111 01010101 11110111 111111110 111111 111101 1110101 10111111 01110101 010111101 1100101 01011010 110110110 01001111 01011111 111111111 111111110 11011111 01010111 11011011 111111011 110111111 111111011 01110101 11011101 0111111 11110101 110111110 111101010 01110101 11111111 111110110 0111110 1 1101101 10110011 01110111 1001011 11110100 11000101 11110101 01011101 11011101 11011101 0101101 10111111 1101101 01111101 111101 01011011 11010101 10010111 1011110 |
Closest metre | Iambic tetrameter |
Characters | 1,892 |
Words | 381 |
Sentences | 17 |
Stanzas | 10 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 6, 6, 6, 6, 6, 1, 6, 6, 7 |
Lines Amount | 56 |
Letters per line (avg) | 26 |
Words per line (avg) | 7 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 145 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 40 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on May 01, 2023
- 1:53 min read
- 378 Views
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"My Library" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 6 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/32297/my-library>.
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