This is an analysis of the poem Our Little Girl that begins with:

Her heart knew naught of sorrow,
Nor the vaguest taint of sin--... full text

Elements of the verse: questions and answers

The information we provided is prepared by means of a special computer program. Use the criteria sheet to understand greatest poems or improve your poetry analysis essay.

  • Rhyme scheme: XaXabcbc dcXcdefe XXbfXaXX
  • Stanza lengths (in strings): 8,8,8,
  • Closest metre: trochaic tetrameter
  • Сlosest rhyme: rima
  • Сlosest stanza type: tercets
  • Guessed form: unknown form
  • Metre: 0111010 1010101 11101010 0010001 10111010 0010101 10101010 1010101 0101110 1010101 111111 0010101 0101110 1110011 10111010 1011101 1101011 1110111 1101010 1110110 10111110 1011101 11001111 110110
  • Amount of stanzas: 3
  • Average number of symbols per stanza: 235
  • Average number of words per stanza: 45
  • Amount of lines: 24
  • Average number of symbols per line: 29 (strings are less long than medium ones)
  • Average number of words per line: 6
  • Mood of the speaker:

    The punctuation marks are various. Neither mark predominates.

  • The author used lexical repetitions to emphasize a significant image; of, and are repeated.

    The author used the same word her at the beginnings of some neighboring stanzas. The figure of speech is a kind of anaphora.

If you write a school or university poetry essay, you should Include in your explanation of the poem:

  • summary of Our Little Girl;
  • central theme;
  • idea of the verse;
  • history of its creation;
  • critical appreciation.

Good luck in your poetry interpretation practice!

More information about poems by James Whitcomb Riley