For You O Democracy

“For You O Democracy” is written as a free verse poem. Free verse poetry is an open form of poetry. It emerged from the French vers libre form, and it does not follow formal poetry conventions of patterned meter, musicality, or rhyme. It typically follows natural speech patterns instead.

The poem consists of three stanzas. The first two stanzas are composed of five lines each, and the final third stanza is composed of two lines. The first two stanzas are composed of a complex sentence. For example, in the first stanza, the stanza opens with the command “Come” (Line 1). Rather than ending the first independent clause with a period to create an independent, punctuated statement, the line ends with a comma. The comma connects the poem’s first line to the poem’s second line—“I will make the most splendid race the sun ever shone upon” (Line 2). The second line is also an independent clause, but like the first, it does not end with a period and ends with a comma. The comma connects the second line to the third line—“I will make divine magnetic lands” (Line 3), which is technically an independent clause.