Picture of an Old Man
Old man, I saw thee in thy garden chairSitting in silence 'mid the shrubs and treesOf thy small cottage-croft, whilst murmuring beesWent by, and almost touched thy temples bare,Edged with a few flakes of the whitest hair.And, soothed by the faint hum of ebbing seas,And song of birds, and breath of the young breeze,Thus didst thou sit, feeling the summer airBlow gently;--with a sad still decadence,Sinking to earth in hope, but all alone.Oh! hast thou wept to feel the lonely senseOf earthly loss, musing on voices gone!Hush the vain murmur, that, without offence,Thy head may rest in peace beneath the churchyard stone.
Words in this poem
- went n.
- Course; way; path; journey; direction.
- didst
- , the 2d pers. sing. imp. of Do.
- decadence n.
- A falling away; decay; deterioration; declension. [LL. decadentia; L. de- + cadere to fall: cf. F. décadence. See Decay.]
- hast
- , 2d pers. sing. pres. of. Fave, contr. of havest.
- offence n.
- The act of offending in any sense; esp., a crime or a sin, an affront or an injury. [F., fr. L. offensa. See Offend.]
- churchyard n.
- The ground adjoining a church, in which the dead are buried; a cemetery.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Picture of an Old Man is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poetical Works of William Lisle Bowles, Vol. 1 With Memoir, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes by George Gilfillan, Project Gutenberg ebook #18915; 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 Lisle Bowles, Picture of an Old Man, in Sonnets, and Other Poems (1789–1837), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #18915, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/bowles-sonnets/picture-of-an-old-man.html, id L09912.
Form and metre
Picture of an Old Man is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABABCDCDEFEFGG, the pattern of the English sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 86% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.1 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 36% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other English sonnets, 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 ABABCDCDEFEFGG chairA · treesB · beesA · bareB · hairC · seasD · breezeC · airD · decadenceE · aloneF · senseE · goneF · offenceG · stoneG
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Old man, I saw thee in thy garden chair | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Sitting in silence 'mid the shrubs and trees | 10 | /˘·/˘····· |
| Of thy small cottage-croft, whilst murmuring bees | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Went by, and almost touched thy temples bare, | 10 | ···/···/˘· |
| Edged with a few flakes of the whitest hair. | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| And, soothed by the faint hum of ebbing seas, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| And song of birds, and breath of the young breeze, | 10 | ·········· |
| Thus didst thou sit, feeling the summer air | 10 | ····/˘·/˘· |
| Blow gently;--with a sad still decadence, | 10 | ·/˘····/˘˘ |
| Sinking to earth in hope, but all alone. | 10 | /˘······˘/ |
| Oh! hast thou wept to feel the lonely sense | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Of earthly loss, musing on voices gone! | 10 | ·/˘·/˘·/˘· |
| Hush the vain murmur, that, without offence, | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Thy head may rest in peace beneath the churchyard stone. | 12 | ·········/·· |
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.