Palinode
Who is Lydia, pray, and whoIs Hypatia? Softly, dear,Let me breathe it in your ear--They are you, and only you.And those other nameless twoWalking in Arcadian air--She that was so very fair?She that had the twilight hair?--They were you, dear, only you.If I speak of night or day,Grace of fern or bloom of grape,Hanging cloud or fountain spray,Gem or star or glistening dew,Or of mythologic shape,Psyche, Pyrrha, Daphne, say--I mean you, dear, you, just you.
Words in this poem
- nameless a.
- Without a name; not having been given a name; as, a nameless star.
- arcadian a.
- Of or pertaining to Arcadia; pastoral; ideally rural; as, Arcadian simplicity or scenery. [L. Arcadius, Arcadicus, fr. Arcadia: cf. F. Arcadien, Arcadique.]
- mythologic a.
- Of or pertaining to mythology or to myths; mythical; fabulous. [L. mythologicus: cf. F. mytholigique.]
- psyche n.
- A lovely maiden, daughter of a king and mistress of Eros, or Cupid. She is regarded as the personification of the soul.
- daphne n.
- A genus of diminutive Shrubs, mostly evergreen, and with fragrant blossoms. [L., a laurel tree, from Gr. .]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Palinode is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Sisters' Tragedy, with Other Poems, Lyrical and Dramatic, Project Gutenberg ebook #595; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Bailey Aldrich, Palinode, in The Sisters' Tragedy, with Other Poems (1891), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #595, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/aldrich-poems/palinode.html, id L10778.
Form and metre
Palinode is 16 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBAACCCADEDAEDA. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.2 syllables. 12% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABBAACCCADEDAEDA whoA · dearB · earB · youA · twoA · airC · fairC · hairC · youA · dayD · grapeE · sprayD · dewA · shapeE · sayD · youA
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Who is Lydia, pray, and who | 8 | ··/˘˘··· |
| Is Hypatia? Softly, dear, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Let me breathe it in your ear-- | 7 | ······· |
| They are you, and only you. | 7 | ····/˘· |
| And those other nameless two | 7 | ··/˘/˘· |
| Walking in Arcadian air-- | 8 | /˘··/˘˘· |
| She that was so very fair? | 7 | ····/˘· |
| She that had the twilight hair?-- | 7 | ····/·· |
| They were you, dear, only you. | 7 | ····/˘· |
| If I speak of night or day, | 7 | ······· |
| Grace of fern or bloom of grape, | 7 | ······· |
| Hanging cloud or fountain spray, | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| Gem or star or glistening dew, | 8 | ····/˘˘· |
| Or of mythologic shape, | 7 | ······· |
| Psyche, Pyrrha, Daphne, say-- | 7 | /˘··/˘· |
| I mean you, dear, you, just you. | 7 | ······· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.