Innanzi, Innanzi!
On, on! through dusky shadows up the hillStretches the shining level of the snow,Which yields and creaks each laboured step I go,My breath preceding in a vapour chill.
Now silent all. There where the clouds stand stillThe moon leaps forth into the blank, to throwAn awful shadow, a gaunt pine below,Of branches crossed and bent in manner ill.
They seem like the uneasy thought of death.O Winter vast, embrace me and quick stayIn icy hold my heart's tempestuous waves!For yet that thought, shipwrecked, again draws breath,And cries to heaven: O Night, O Winter, say,What are the dead doing down there in their graves?
Words in this poem
- laboured a.
- Bearing marks of labor and effort; elaborately wrought; not easy or natural; as, labored poetry; a labored style.
- vapour n.
- Any substance in the gaseous, or aëriform, state, the condition of which is ordinarily that of a liquid or solid. [OE. vapour, OF. vapour, vapor, vapeur, F. vapeur, L. vapor; probably for cvapor, and akin to Gr. kvepti to breathe, smell, Russ. kopote fine soot. Cf. Vapid.]
- gaunt a.
- Attenuated, as with fasting or suffering; lean; meager; pinched and grim. [Cf. Norw. gand a thin pointed stick, a tall and thin man, and W. gwan weak.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Innanzi, Innanzi! is in the public domain. This text is taken from By Frank Sewall (London: Osgood, McIlvaine & Co., 1893), Project Gutenberg ebook #56711, the Frank Sewall translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Giosuè Carducci, Innanzi, Innanzi!, in Poems of Giosuè Carducci (1893), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #56711, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/carducci-poems/innanzi-innanzi.html, id L26520.
Form and metre
Innanzi, Innanzi! is 14 lines in 3 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is ABBA, complete in 2 of its 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABBA hillA · snowB · goB · chillA
- 2 ABBA stillA · throwB · belowB · illA
- 3 ABCABC deathA · stayB · wavesC · breathA · sayB · gravesC
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| On, on! through dusky shadows up the hill | 10 | ···/˘/···· |
| Stretches the shining level of the snow, | 10 | /˘·/˘/˘··· |
| Which yields and creaks each laboured step I go, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| My breath preceding in a vapour chill. | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘· |
| Now silent all. There where the clouds stand still | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| The moon leaps forth into the blank, to throw | 10 | ·········· |
| An awful shadow, a gaunt pine below, | 10 | ·/˘/······ |
| Of branches crossed and bent in manner ill. | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| They seem like the uneasy thought of death. | 10 | ····˘/˘··· |
| O Winter vast, embrace me and quick stay | 10 | ·/˘·˘/···· |
| In icy hold my heart's tempestuous waves! | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| For yet that thought, shipwrecked, again draws breath, | 10 | ····/˘˘/·· |
| And cries to heaven: O Night, O Winter, say, | 10 | ···/···/˘· |
| What are the dead doing down there in their graves? | 10 | ····/····· |
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.