Analysis of Rebirth
Rudyard Kipling 1865 (Mumbai) – 1936 (London)
If any God should say,
"I will restore
The world her yesterday
Whole as before
My Judgment blasted it"--who would not lift
Heart, eye, and hand in passion o'er the gift?
If any God should will
To wipe from mind
The memory of this ill
Which is Mankind
In soul and substance now--who would not bless
Even to tears His loving-tenderness?
If any God should give
Us leave to fly
These present deaths we live,
And safely die
In those lost lives we lived ere we were born--
What man but would not laugh the excuse to scorn?
For we are what we are--
So broke to blood
And the strict works of war--
So long subdued
To sacrifice, that threadbare Death commands
Hardly observance at our busier hands.
Yet we were what we were,
And, fashioned so,
It pleases us to stare
At the far show
Of unbelievable years and shapes that flit,
In our own likeness, on the edge of it.
Scheme | ABABCC DEDEXX XFXFGG XXBXHH XIXIJJ |
---|---|
Poetic Form | Tetractys (33%) Etheree (20%) |
Metre | 110111 1101 01010 1101 1101011111 11010101001 110111 1111 0100111 1111 0101011111 1011110100 110111 1111 110111 0101 0111111101 11111100111 111111 1111 001111 1101 11011101 100101101001 110110 0101 110111 1011 1010010111 01011010111 |
Closest metre | Iambic trimeter |
Characters | 843 |
Words | 166 |
Sentences | 6 |
Stanzas | 5 |
Stanza Lengths | 6, 6, 6, 6, 6 |
Lines Amount | 30 |
Letters per line (avg) | 22 |
Words per line (avg) | 5 |
Letters per stanza (avg) | 133 |
Words per stanza (avg) | 33 |
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Submitted on May 13, 2011
Modified on March 05, 2023
- 50 sec read
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"Rebirth" Poetry.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 3 Jun 2024. <https://www.poetry.com/poem-analysis/33319/rebirth>.
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