Analysis of Love And Life

Edith Nesbit 1858 (Kennington, Surrey ) – 1924 (New Romney, Kent)



LOVE only sings when Love is young,
When Love is young and still at play,
How shall we count the sweet songs sung
When Love and Joy kept holiday?
But now Love has to earn his bread
By lifelong stress and toil of tears,
He finds his nest of song-birds dead
That sang so sweet in other years.

For Love's a man now, strong and brave,
To fight for you, for you to live,
And Love, that once such bright songs gave,
Has better things than songs to give;
He gives you now a lifelong faith,
A hand to help in joy or pain,
And he will sing no more, till Death
Shall come to make him young again!


Scheme ABABCXCX DXDXXXXX
Poetic Form
Metre 11011111 11110111 11110111 1101110 11111111 11110111 11111111 11110101 11011101 11111111 01111111 11011111 11110111 01110111 01111111 11111101
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 579
Words 121
Sentences 4
Stanzas 2
Stanza Lengths 8, 8
Lines Amount 16
Letters per line (avg) 28
Words per line (avg) 7
Letters per stanza (avg) 225
Words per stanza (avg) 60
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on March 14, 2023

36 sec read
131

Edith Nesbit

Edith Nesbit (married name Edith Bland) was an English author and poet; she published her books for children under the name of E. Nesbit. She wrote or collaborated on more than 60 books of children's literature. She was also a political activist and co-founded the Fabian Society, a socialist organisation later affiliated to the Labour Party. more…

All Edith Nesbit poems | Edith Nesbit Books

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