“Sympathy” is a lyrical poem written in first person. It includes three stanzas with relatively regular rhyme. The first and third stanzas have the rhyme scheme ABAABCC. The second stanza has the rhyme scheme ABAABAA. The first and last lines within each stanza are virtually identical, and these lines are the speaker’s declaration that they understand the reality of life in a cage. The other lines in each stanza include concrete details about the life of the bird. This structure derives from the extended metaphor between bird and speaker throughout the poem.

In terms of meter, most of the poetic feet are iambs (an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable) and anapests (two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable). There are generally three to four feet per line. For example, “And the faint | perfume | from its cha | lice steals—” (Line 6) has four feet (tetrameter) and includes an anapest followed by an iamb, another anapest, and an iamb. The following line, “I know what | the caged | bird feels!” (Line 7)—has three feet (trimeter) with an anapest followed by two iambs.