Inscription to Miss Jessy Lewars
On a copy of the Scots Musical Museum, in four volumes, presented to her byBurns.
Thine be the volumes, Jessy fair,And with them take the Poet’s prayer,That Fate may, in her fairest page,With ev’ry kindliest, best presageOf future bliss, enroll thy name:With native worth and spotless fame,And wakeful caution, still awareOf ill—but chief, Man’s felon snare;
All blameless joys on earth we find,And all the treasures of the mind—These be thy guardian and reward;So prays thy faithful friend, the Bard.
Words in this poem
- wakeful a.
- Not sleeping; indisposed to sleep; watchful; vigilant.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Inscription to Miss Jessy Lewars is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems and Songs of Robert Burns, Project Gutenberg ebook #1279; 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 Burns, Inscription to Miss Jessy Lewars, in Poems and Songs (1786–1796), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1279, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/burns-poems/inscription-to-miss-jessy-lewars.html, id L03457.
Form and metre
Inscription to Miss Jessy Lewars is 14 lines in 3 verse paragraphs. It is in rhyming couplets, 71% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 93%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.5 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 21% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, other poems in iambic tetrameter.
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.
- 2 AABBCCAA fairA · prayerA · pageB · presageB · nameC · fameC · awareA · snareA
- 3 AA-- findA · mindA · reward · bard
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| On a copy of the Scots Musical Museum, in four volumes, presented to her by | 22 | ··/˘···/˘˘/˘··/˘˘/˘··· |
| Burns. | 1 | · |
| Thine be the volumes, Jessy fair, | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| And with them take the Poet’s prayer, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| That Fate may, in her fairest page, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| With ev’ry kindliest, best presage | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Of future bliss, enroll thy name: | 8 | ·/˘·˘/·· |
| With native worth and spotless fame, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| And wakeful caution, still aware | 8 | ·/˘/˘·˘/ |
| Of ill—but chief, Man’s felon snare; | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| All blameless joys on earth we find, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| And all the treasures of the mind— | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| These be thy guardian and reward; | 8 | ···/˘·˘/ |
| So prays thy faithful friend, the Bard. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
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.