On Seeing An Officer's Widow Distracted by Mary Barber: poem analysis

This is an analysis of the poem On Seeing An Officer's Widow Distracted that begins with:

O wretch! hath Madness cur'd thy dire Despair?
Yes--All thy Sorrows now are light as Air:...

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: aabbccddbb eeaacccc aaffccgg cchhcc
  • Stanza lengths (in strings): 10,8,8,6,
  • Closest metre: iambic pentameter
  • Сlosest rhyme: couplets
  • Сlosest stanza type: sonnet
  • Guessed form: heroic couplets
  • Metre: 11110111001 1111011111 1111111101 1101010101 1100110001 1111111101 0101111111 1101010011 1100010111 1001001101 11111011011 1100100101 1101110101 010010110001 11010101010 11111101010 1001110001 0111001111 1101110101 1101011101 1111001101 1011010111 1101111101 11010111111 1111000101 1101010101 1010010101 1111110111 1100010111 1101100011 01010111001 1100110101
  • Amount of stanzas: 4
  • Average number of symbols per stanza: 358
  • Average number of words per stanza: 63
  • Amount of lines: 32
  • Average number of symbols per line: 44 (strings are more long than medium ones)
  • Average number of words per line: 8

  • Mood of the speaker:

    The punctuation marks are various. Neither mark predominates.

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

    The poet used anaphora at the beginnings of some neighboring lines. The same word nor is repeated.

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

  • summary of On Seeing An Officer's Widow Distracted;
  • central theme;
  • idea of the verse;
  • history of its creation;
  • critical appreciation.

Good luck in your poetry interpretation practice!

More information about poems by Mary Barber

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