Analysis of Ethiopia Saluting The Colors
Walt Whitman 1819 (West Hills) – 1892 (Camden)
WHO are you, dusky woman, so ancient, hardly human,
With your woolly-white and turban'd head, and bare bony feet?
Why, rising by the roadside here, do you the colors greet?
('Tis while our army lines Carolina's sand and pines,
Forth from thy hovel door, thou, Ethiopia, com'st to me,
As, under doughty Sherman, I march toward the sea.)
Me, master, years a hundred, since from my parents sunder'd,
A little child, they caught me as the savage beast is caught;
Then hither me, across the sea, the cruel slaver brought.
No further does she say, but lingering all the day, 10
Her high-borne turban'd head she wags, and rolls her darkling eye,
And curtseys to the regiments, the guidons moving by.
What is it, fateful woman--so blear, hardly human?
Why wag your head, with turban bound--yellow, red and green?
Are the things so strange and marvelous, you see or have seen?
Scheme | ABB XCC BXX XDD AEE |
---|---|
Poetic Form | |
Metre | 1111101101010 1110101101101 1101011110101 1110101010101 111101101001111 1101010110101 1101010111101 01011111010111 1101010101011 1101111100101 011111101011 011010001101 1111010111010 1111110110101 10111010011111 |
Closest metre | Iambic heptameter |
Characters | 921 |
Words | 154 |
Sentences | 9 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 3, 3, 3, 3, 3 |
Lines Amount | 15 |
Letters per line (avg) | 44 |
Words per line (avg) | 11 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 133 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 33 |
Font size:
Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 29, 2023
- 48 sec read
- 110 Views
Citation
Use the citation below to add this poem analysis to your bibliography:
Style:MLAChicagoAPA
"Ethiopia Saluting The Colors" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 19 May 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/38004/ethiopia-saluting-the-colors>.
Discuss this Walt Whitman poem analysis with the community:
Report Comment
We're doing our best to make sure our content is useful, accurate and safe.
If by any chance you spot an inappropriate comment while navigating through our website please use this form to let us know, and we'll take care of it shortly.
Attachment
You need to be logged in to favorite.
Log In