From the Greek
Mortal though I bé, yea ephemeral, if but a momentI gaze up to the night's starry domain of heaven,Then no longer on earth I stand; I touch the Creator,And my lively spirit drinketh immortality.See, Love, a year is pass'd: in harvest our summer endeth:
Words in this poem
- starry a.
- Abounding with stars; adorned with stars.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
From the Greek is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poetical Works of Robert Bridges, Excluding the Eight Dramas, Project Gutenberg ebook #37804; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Robert Bridges, From the Greek, in The Growth of Love, and Other Poems (1873–1912), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #37804, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/bridges-shorter-poems/from-the-greek.html, id L01855.
Form and metre
From the Greek is 5 lines in a single stanza. The lines average 12.8 syllables. 3 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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.
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Mortal though I bé, yea ephemeral, if but a moment | 14 | /˘····˘/˘···/˘ |
| I gaze up to the night's starry domain of heaven, | 12 | ······/˘˘/·/ |
| Then no longer on earth I stand; I touch the Creator, | 14 | ··/˘·······˘/˘ |
| And my lively spirit drinketh immortality. | 11 | ··/˘//˘·˘/˘ |
| See, Love, a year is pass'd: in harvest our summer endeth: | 14 | ·······/˘//˘·· |
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.