The Ox
I love thee, pious ox; a gentle feelingOf vigour and of peace thou giv'st my heart.How solemn, like a monument, thou art!Over wide fertile fields thy calm gaze stealing,Unto the yoke with grave contentment kneeling,To man's quick work thou dost thy strength impart.He shouts and goads, and answering thy smart,Thou turn'st on him thy patient eyes appealing.
From thy broad nostrils, black and wet, ariseThy breath's soft fumes; and on the still air swells,Like happy hymn, thy lowing's mellow strain.In the grave sweetness of thy tranquil eyesOf emerald, broad and still reflected dwellsAll the divine green silence of the plain.
Words in this poem
- vigour v. t.
- To invigorate. Feltham.
- appealing a.
- That appeals; imploring.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Ox 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, The Ox, in Poems of Giosuè Carducci (1893), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #56711, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/carducci-poems/the-ox.html, id L26514.
Form and metre
The Ox is 14 lines in 2 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 ABBAABBA feelingA · heartB · artB · stealingA · kneelingA · impartB · smartB · appealingA
- 2 ABCABC ariseA · swellsB · strainC · eyesA · dwellsB · plainC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I love thee, pious ox; a gentle feeling | 11 | ···/˘··/˘/˘ |
| Of vigour and of peace thou giv'st my heart. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| How solemn, like a monument, thou art! | 10 | ·/˘··/˘˘·· |
| Over wide fertile fields thy calm gaze stealing, | 11 | ···/˘····/˘ |
| Unto the yoke with grave contentment kneeling, | 11 | ······˘/˘/˘ |
| To man's quick work thou dost thy strength impart. | 10 | ········˘/ |
| He shouts and goads, and answering thy smart, | 10 | ·····/˘˘·· |
| Thou turn'st on him thy patient eyes appealing. | 11 | ·····/˘·˘/˘ |
| From thy broad nostrils, black and wet, arise | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Thy breath's soft fumes; and on the still air swells, | 10 | ·········· |
| Like happy hymn, thy lowing's mellow strain. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| In the grave sweetness of thy tranquil eyes | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Of emerald, broad and still reflected dwells | 10 | ·/˘···˘/˘· |
| All the divine green silence of the plain. | 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.