The Blossom
Merry, merry sparrow!Under leaves so greenA happy blossomSees you, swift as arrow,Seek your cradle narrow,Near my bosom.Pretty, pretty robin!Under leaves so greenA happy blossomHears you sobbing, sobbing,Pretty, pretty robin,Near my bosom.
Words in this poem
- sobbing n.
- A series of short, convulsive inspirations, the glottis being suddenly closed so that little or no air enters into the lungs.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Blossom is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems of William Blake, Project Gutenberg ebook #574; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: William Blake, The Blossom, in Poems of William Blake (1783–1794), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #574, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/blake-poems/the-blossom.html, id L01986.
Form and metre
The Blossom is 12 lines in a single stanza. The metre is trochaic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 98%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 5.3 syllables. 10 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 33% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic 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 ABCAADEBC-ED sparrowA · greenB · blossomC · arrowA · narrowA · bosomD · robinE · greenB · blossomC · sobbing · robinE · bosomD
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Merry, merry sparrow! | 6 | /˘/˘/˘ |
| Under leaves so green | 5 | ····· |
| A happy blossom | 5 | ·/˘/˘ |
| Sees you, swift as arrow, | 6 | ····/˘ |
| Seek your cradle narrow, | 6 | ··/˘/˘ |
| Near my bosom. | 4 | ··/˘ |
| Pretty, pretty robin! | 6 | /˘/˘/˘ |
| Under leaves so green | 5 | ····· |
| A happy blossom | 5 | ·/˘/˘ |
| Hears you sobbing, sobbing, | 6 | ··/˘/˘ |
| Pretty, pretty robin, | 6 | /˘/˘/˘ |
| Near my bosom. | 4 | ··/˘ |
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.