Nos Immortales
Perhaps we go with wind and cloud and sun,Into the free companionship of air;Perhaps with sunsets when the day is done,All's one to me -- I do not greatly care;So long as there are brown hills -- and a treeLike a mad prophet in a land of dearth --And I can lie and hear eternallyThe vast monotonous breathing of the earth.
I have known hours, slow and golden-glowing,Lovely with laughter and suffused with light,O Lord, in such a time appoint my going,When the hands clench, and the cold face grows white,And the spark dies within the feeble brain,Spilling its star-dust back to dust again.
Words in this poem
- dearth n.
- Scarcity which renders dear; want; lack; specifically, lack of food on account of failure of crops; famine. [OE. derthe, fr. dere. See Dear.]
- eternally adv.
- In an eternal manner.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Nos Immortales is in the public domain. This text is taken from Young Adventure: A Book of Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #312; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Stephen Vincent Benét, Nos Immortales, in Young Adventure (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #312, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/benet-young-adventure/nos-immortales.html, id L13381.
Form and metre
Nos Immortales is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 14% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 ABAB-C-C sunA · airB · doneA · careB · tree · dearthC · eternally · earthC
- 2 ABABCC glowingA · lightB · goingA · whiteB · brainC · againC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Perhaps we go with wind and cloud and sun, | 10 | ˘/········ |
| Into the free companionship of air; | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| Perhaps with sunsets when the day is done, | 10 | ˘/·/······ |
| All's one to me -- I do not greatly care; | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| So long as there are brown hills -- and a tree | 10 | ·········· |
| Like a mad prophet in a land of dearth -- | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| And I can lie and hear eternally | 10 | ······˘/˘˘ |
| The vast monotonous breathing of the earth. | 10 | ··˘/˘/˘··· |
| I have known hours, slow and golden-glowing, | 11 | ···/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Lovely with laughter and suffused with light, | 10 | /˘·/˘·˘/·· |
| O Lord, in such a time appoint my going, | 11 | ······˘/·/˘ |
| When the hands clench, and the cold face grows white, | 10 | ·········· |
| And the spark dies within the feeble brain, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Spilling its star-dust back to dust again. | 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.