Maid of Athens, Ere We Part.N
Maid of Athens, ere we part,Give, oh give me back my heart!Or, since that has left my breast,Keep it now, and take the rest!Hear my vow before I go,
By those tresses unconfined,Wooed by each AEgean wind;By those lids whose jetty fringeKiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge;By those wild eyes like the roe,
By that lip I long to taste;By that zone-encircled waist;By all the token-flowers that tellWhat words can never speak so well;By love's alternate joy and woe,
Maid of Athens! I am gone:Think of me, sweet! when alone.Though I fly to Istambol,Athens holds my heart and soul:Can I cease to love thee? No!
Words in this poem
- jetty v. i.
- To jut out; to project. Florio.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Maid of Athens, Ere We Part.N 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, Maid of Athens, Ere We Part.N, in The Giaour, and Other Poems (1816), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #21811, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/byron-works-3/maid-of-athens-ere-we-part-n.html, id L23834.
Form and metre
Maid of Athens, Ere We Part.N is 20 lines in 4 stanzas of 5 lines each. It is in rhyming couplets, 60% of the lines. The metre is trochaic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 89%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in trochaic 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 AABBC partA · heartA · breastB · restB · goC
- 2 DDEEC unconfinedD · windD · fringeE · tingeE · roeC
- 3 FFGGC tasteF · waistF · tellG · wellG · woeC
- 4 ----C gone · alone · istambol · soul · noC
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 trochaic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Maid of Athens, ere we part, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Give, oh give me back my heart! | 7 | ······· |
| Or, since that has left my breast, | 7 | ······· |
| Keep it now, and take the rest! | 7 | ······· |
| Hear my vow before I go, | 7 | ······· |
| By those tresses unconfined, | 8 | ··/˘·˘/˘ |
| Wooed by each AEgean wind; | 8 | ·˘··˘/˘· |
| By those lids whose jetty fringe | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Kiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge; | 7 | ····/˘· |
| By those wild eyes like the roe, | 7 | ······· |
| By that lip I long to taste; | 7 | ······· |
| By that zone-encircled waist; | 8 | ···˘/˘˘· |
| By all the token-flowers that tell | 8 | ···/˘/·· |
| What words can never speak so well; | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| By love's alternate joy and woe, | 8 | ··/˘···· |
| Maid of Athens! I am gone: | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Think of me, sweet! when alone. | 7 | ·····˘/ |
| Though I fly to Istambol, | 7 | ······· |
| Athens holds my heart and soul: | 7 | /˘····· |
| Can I cease to love thee? No! | 7 | ······· |
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.