Oyvind's Song
Lift thy head, thou undaunted youth!Though some hope may now break, forsooth,Brighter a new one and higherShall throe eye fill with its fire.
Lift thy head to the vision clear!Something near thee is calling: "Here!"--Something with myriad voicing,Ever in courage rejoicing.
Lift thy head, for an azure heightRears within thee a vault of light;Music of harps there is ringing,Jubilant, rapturous singing.
Lift thy head and thy longing sing!None shall conquer the growing spring;Where there is life-making power,Time shall set free the flower.
Lift thy head and thyself baptizeIn the hopes that radiant rise,Heaven to earth foreshowing,And in each life-spark glowing!
Words in this poem
- undaunted a.
- Not daunted; not subdued or depressed by fear.
- forsooth v. t.
- To address respectfully with the term forsooth.
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- throe n.
- Extreme pain; violent pang; anguish; agony; especially, one of the pangs of travail in childbirth, or purturition. [OE. , , AS. a threatening, oppression, suffering, perhaps influenced by Icel. a throe, a pang, a longing; cf. AS. to suffer.]
- myriad n.
- The number of ten thousand; ten thousand persons or things. [Gr. myriade.]
- jubilant a.
- Uttering songs of triumph; shouting with joy; triumphant; exulting. [L. jubilans, -antis, p. pr. of jubilare to shout for joy: cf. F. jubila. See Jubilate.]
- baptize v. t.
- To administer the sacrament of baptism to. [F. baptiser, L. baptizare, fr.Gr. . See Baptism.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Oyvind's Song is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems and Songs, Project Gutenberg ebook #6619, the Arthur Hubbell Palmer translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Oyvind's Song, in Poems and Songs (1915), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #6619, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/bjornson-poems-and-songs/oyvind-s-song.html, id L29247.
Form and metre
Oyvind's Song is 20 lines in 5 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes AABB. The metre is dactylic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 82%).
See other poems in dactylic trimeter.
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 AABB youthA · forsoothA · higherB · fireB
- 2 AABB clearA · hereA · voicingB · rejoicingB
- 3 AABB heightA · lightA · ringingB · singingB
- 4 AABB singA · springA · powerB · flowerB
- 5 AABB baptizeA · riseA · foreshowingB · glowingB
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 dactylic trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Lift thy head, thou undaunted youth! | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| Though some hope may now break, forsooth, | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Brighter a new one and higher | 8 | /˘····/˘ |
| Shall throe eye fill with its fire. | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Lift thy head to the vision clear! | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Something near thee is calling: "Here!"-- | 8 | /˘···/˘· |
| Something with myriad voicing, | 8 | /˘·/˘˘/˘ |
| Ever in courage rejoicing. | 8 | /˘·/˘˘/˘ |
| Lift thy head, for an azure height | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Rears within thee a vault of light; | 8 | ········ |
| Music of harps there is ringing, | 8 | /˘····/˘ |
| Jubilant, rapturous singing. | 8 | /˘˘/˘˘/˘ |
| Lift thy head and thy longing sing! | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| None shall conquer the growing spring; | 8 | ··/˘·/˘· |
| Where there is life-making power, | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| Time shall set free the flower. | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Lift thy head and thyself baptize | 8 | ····˘/˘/ |
| In the hopes that radiant rise, | 8 | ····/˘˘· |
| Heaven to earth foreshowing, | 8 | /˘······ |
| And in each life-spark glowing! | 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.