Laurel · Poems by form and metre

Alexandrines

Lines of six iambs, twelve syllables, the standard line of French verse and the closing line of the Spenserian stanza. Below, what the metre is and how to recognise it, then every poem on Laurel measured as alexandrines, with how closely each keeps it.

What alexandrines is

Lines of six beats, light then heavy, twelve syllables, with a pause after the sixth. The standard line of French verse; in English mostly the last line of a Spenserian stanza.

da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM

that LIKE a WOUN-ded SNAKE, drags ITS slow LENGTH a-LONG
Pope, An Essay on Criticism; the beats in capitals

How to tell

Twelve syllables that break in the middle. A whole poem in alexandrines is rare in English; look for them closing a stanza of pentameters.

Paste a poem of your own and Laurel will say whether it is in alexandrines, stanza by stanza. How to scan a line.

36 poems on Laurel in alexandrines

  1. One’s-Self I Sing Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass · 86%
  2. Fallen Majesty W. B. Yeats, Responsibilities · 93%
  3. Amor Mundi Christina Rossetti, Goblin Market and Other Poems · 71%
  4. Longing Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 100%
  5. The 'Eathen Rudyard Kipling, Verses 1889–1896 · 87%
  6. Heard at Nahant Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Complete Poetical Works · 89%
  7. Firelight Ivor Gurney, Severn and Somme · 93%
  8. Scots Ivor Gurney, Severn and Somme · 92%
  9. Vision John Masefield, Salt-Water Ballads · 94%
  10. A Valediction John Masefield, Salt-Water Ballads · 94%
  11. A Fragment Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë, Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell · 94%
  12. Return of the Heroes Siegfried Sassoon, The War Poems · 91%
  13. There's Wisdom in Women Rupert Brooke, 1914 and Other Poems · 86%
  14. Vesperal Ernest Dowson, The Poems of Ernest Dowson · 93%
  15. Carthusians Ernest Dowson, The Poems of Ernest Dowson · 82%
  16. To One in Bedlam Ernest Dowson, The Poems of Ernest Dowson · 80%
  17. Dust Sara Teasdale, Flame and Shadow · 91%
  18. The Sultan's Palace Alan Seeger, Poems · 94%
  19. Do You Remember Once I Alan Seeger, Poems · 94%
  20. The Past was goodly once, and yet, when all is said W. E. Henley, Poems · 94%
  21. We’LL go no more a-roving by the light of the moon W. E. Henley, Poems · 84%
  22. To the Rev. Radclyffe Dolling Lionel Johnson, Poems · 96%
  23. From the German of Uhland William Cullen Bryant, Poems · 72%
  24. The Rhyme of the Restless Ones Robert W. Service, Songs of a Sourdough · 95%
  25. Answer to Prayer James Weldon Johnson, Fifty Years and Other Poems · 96%
  26. Glenlogie Arthur Quiller-Couch, The Oxford Book of Ballads · 98%
  27. Langueur Paul Verlaine, Poems · 96%
  28. The Marriage of the Cid's Daughters CI Anonymous, The Lay of the Cid · 93%
  29. What Sayst Thou, Traveller, of All Thou Saw'St Afar? Paul Verlaine, Poems · 91%
  30. Mon Reve Familier Paul Verlaine, Poems · 91%
  31. The Message George William Russell, The Divine Vision and Other Poems · 88%
  32. The Vision of Love George William Russell, The Divine Vision and Other Poems · 86%
  33. Beauty George William Russell, The Divine Vision and Other Poems · 82%
  34. The Sailing of the Long-Ships (October, 1899) Henry John Newbolt, Poems: New and Old · 80%
  35. Another Version William Makepeace Thackeray, Ballads · 80%
  36. The Painful Plough Robert Bell, Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England · 76%

Each poem's metre was measured from its own words by the method described here; the figure beside a poem is the share of its stressed syllables that fall on the beat. Forms are named from the rhyme scheme and line count together.