The Shepherd
How sweet is the Shepherd's sweet lot!From the morn to the evening he stays;He shall follow his sheep all the day,And his tongue shall be filled with praise.
For he hears the lambs' innocent call,And he hears the ewes' tender reply;He is watching while they are in peace,For they know when their Shepherd is nigh.
Words in this poem
- morn n.
- The first part of the day; the morning; -- used chiefly in poetry. [OE. morwen, morgen, AS. morgen; akin to D. morgen, OS. morgan, G. morgen, Icel. morginn, morgunn, Sw. morgon, Dan. morgen, Goth. maúrgins. Cf. Morrow, Morning.]
- 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,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Shepherd 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 Shepherd, in Poems of William Blake (1783–1794), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #574, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/blake-poems/the-shepherd.html, id L01982.
Form and metre
The Shepherd is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is anapaestic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 95%). 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.9 syllables.
See other poems in anapaestic 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 -A-A lot · staysA · day · praiseA
- 2 -A-A call · replyA · peace · nighA
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 anapaestic trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| How sweet is the Shepherd's sweet lot! | 8 | ····/˘·· |
| From the morn to the evening he stays; | 9 | ·····/˘·· |
| He shall follow his sheep all the day, | 9 | ··/˘····· |
| And his tongue shall be filled with praise. | 9 | ······˘·· |
| For he hears the lambs' innocent call, | 9 | ·····/˘˘· |
| And he hears the ewes' tender reply; | 9 | ·····/˘˘/ |
| He is watching while they are in peace, | 9 | ··/˘····· |
| For they know when their Shepherd is nigh. | 9 | ·····/˘·· |
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.