Echoes
In Nature's temple, living columns rise,Which oftentimes give tongue to words subdued,And Man traverses this symbolic wood,Which looks at him with half familiar eyes,
Like lingering echoes, which afar confoundThemselves in deep and sombre unity,As vast as Night, and like transplendency,The scents and colours to each other respond.
And scents there are, like infant's flesh as chaste,As sweet as oboes, and as meadows fair,And others, proud, corrupted, rich and vast,
Which have the expansion of infinity,Like amber, musk and frankincense and myrrh,That sing the soul's and senses' ecstasy.
Words in this poem
- oftentimes adv.
- Frequently; often; many times. [Often + time. Cf. -wards.]
- afar adv.
- At, to, or from a great distance; far away; -- often used with from preceding, or off following; as, he was seen from afar; I saw him afar off. [Pref. a-.(for on or of) + far.]
- sombre n.
- Gloom; obscurity; duskiness; somberness.
- transplendency n.
- Quality or state of being transplendent. Dr. H. More.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Echoes is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Flowers of Evil, Project Gutenberg ebook #36098; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Charles Baudelaire, Echoes, in The Flowers of Evil (1909), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #36098, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/baudelaire-flowers-of-evil/echoes.html, id L25395.
Form and metre
Echoes is 14 lines in 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 A--A riseA · subdued · wood · eyesA
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 iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| In Nature's temple, living columns rise, | 10 | ·/˘/˘/˘/˘· |
| Which oftentimes give tongue to words subdued, | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| And Man traverses this symbolic wood, | 10 | ··/˘˘·˘/˘· |
| Which looks at him with half familiar eyes, | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| Like lingering echoes, which afar confound | 10 | ·/˘/˘·˘/˘/ |
| Themselves in deep and sombre unity, | 10 | ˘/···/˘/˘˘ |
| As vast as Night, and like transplendency, | 10 | ······˘/˘˘ |
| The scents and colours to each other respond. | 11 | ···/˘··/˘˘/ |
| And scents there are, like infant's flesh as chaste, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| As sweet as oboes, and as meadows fair, | 10 | ···/˘··/·· |
| And others, proud, corrupted, rich and vast, | 10 | ·/˘·˘/˘··· |
| Which have the expansion of infinity, | 11 | ···˘/˘·˘/˘˘ |
| Like amber, musk and frankincense and myrrh, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| That sing the soul's and senses' ecstasy. | 10 | ·····/˘/˘˘ |
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.