Analysis of The Test



I hung my verses in the wind,
Time and tide their faults may find.
All were winnowed through and through,
Five lines lasted sound and true;
Five were smelted in a pot
Than the South more fierce and hot;
These the siroc could not melt,
Fire their fiercer flaming felt,
And the meaning was more white
Than July's meridian light.
Sunshine cannot bleach the snow,
Nor time unmake what poets know.
Have you eyes to find the five
Which five hundred did survive?


Scheme AABBCCDDEEFFGG
Poetic Form ~Onegin Stanzas 
Metre 11110001 1011111 101101 1110101 101001 1011101 101111 10110101 0010111 1101001 110101 1111101 1111101 1110101
Closest metre Iambic tetrameter
Characters 450
Words 85
Sentences 5
Stanzas 1
Stanza Lengths 14
Lines Amount 14
Letters per line (avg) 26
Words per line (avg) 6
Letters per stanza (avg) 361
Words per stanza (avg) 83
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Submitted on May 13, 2011

Modified on April 13, 2023

25 sec read
399

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. more…

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