If That High World I
If that high world, which lies beyondOur own, surviving Love endears;If there the cherished heart be fond,The eye the same, except in tears--How welcome those untrodden spheres!How sweet this very hour to die!To soar from earth and find all fearsLost in thy light--Eternity!
Words in this poem
- surviving a.
- Remaining alive; yet living or existing; as, surviving friends; surviving customs.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
If That High World I is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Works of Lord Byron. Vol. 3, Project Gutenberg ebook #21811; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Lord Byron, If That High World I, in The Giaour, and Other Poems (1816), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #21811, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/byron-works-3/if-that-high-world-i.html, id L23938.
Form and metre
If That High World I is 8 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
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 ABABB-B- beyondA · endearsB · fondA · tearsB · spheresB · die · fearsB · eternity
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 |
|---|---|---|
| If that high world, which lies beyond | 8 | ········ |
| Our own, surviving Love endears; | 8 | /·˘/˘·˘/ |
| If there the cherished heart be fond, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The eye the same, except in tears-- | 8 | ········ |
| How welcome those untrodden spheres! | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| How sweet this very hour to die! | 8 | ···/˘/·· |
| To soar from earth and find all fears | 8 | ········ |
| Lost in thy light--Eternity! | 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.