Tho’ Cruel Fate Should Bid Us Part
Tho’ cruel fate should bid us part,Far as the pole and line,Her dear idea round my heart,Should tenderly entwine.Tho’ mountains, rise, and deserts howl,And oceans roar between;Yet, dearer than my deathless soul,I still would love my Jean.
Words in this poem
- tenderly adv.
- In a tender manner; with tenderness; mildly; gently; softly; in a manner not to injure or give pain; with pity or affection; kindly.
- entwine v. t.
- To twine, twist, or wreathe together or round. [Pref. en- + twine. Cf. Intwine.]
- deathless a.
- Not subject to death, destruction, or extinction; immortal; undying; imperishable; as, deathless beings; deathless fame.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Tho’ Cruel Fate Should Bid Us Part 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, Tho’ Cruel Fate Should Bid Us Part, in Poems and Songs (1786–1796), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1279, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/burns-poems/tho-cruel-fate-should-bid-us-part.html, id L02979.
Form and metre
Tho’ Cruel Fate Should Bid Us Part is 8 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 96%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.0 syllables.
See 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.
- 1 ABAB-C-C partA · lineB · heartA · entwineB · howl · betweenC · soul · jeanC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Tho’ cruel fate should bid us part, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Far as the pole and line, | 6 | ······ |
| Her dear idea round my heart, | 8 | ··˘/˘··· |
| Should tenderly entwine. | 6 | ·/˘˘˘/ |
| Tho’ mountains, rise, and deserts howl, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| And oceans roar between; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Yet, dearer than my deathless soul, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| I still would love my Jean. | 6 | ······ |
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.