Daisies
Over the shoulders and slopes of the duneI saw the white daisies go down to the sea,A host in the sunshine, an army in June,The people God sends us to set our heart free.
The bobolinks rallied them up from the dell,The orioles whistled them out of the wood;And all of their singing was, "Earth, it is well!"And all of their dancing was, "Life, thou art good!"
Words in this poem
- dune n.
- A low hill of drifting sand usually formed on the coats, but often carried far inland by the prevailing winds. [The same word as down: cf. D. duin. See Down a bank of sand.]
- sunshine n.
- The light of the sun, or the place where it shines; the direct rays of the sun, the place where they fall, or the warmth and light which they give.
- dell n.
- A small, retired valley; a ravine. [AS. del, akin to E. dale; cf. D. delle, del, low ground. See Dale.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Daisies is in the public domain. This text is taken from More Songs From Vagabondia, Project Gutenberg ebook #18007; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Bliss Carman, Daisies, in More Songs from Vagabondia (1896), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #18007, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/carman-vagabondia/daisies.html, id L24691.
Form and metre
Daisies is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABAB. The metre is anapaestic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 93%).
See other poems in anapaestic 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 duneA · seaB · juneA · freeB
- 2 ABAB dellA · woodB · wellA · goodB
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 anapaestic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Over the shoulders and slopes of the dune | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| I saw the white daisies go down to the sea, | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| A host in the sunshine, an army in June, | 11 | ····/··/˘·· |
| The people God sends us to set our heart free. | 11 | ·/˘·····/·· |
| The bobolinks rallied them up from the dell, | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| The orioles whistled them out of the wood; | 11 | ·/˘·/˘····· |
| And all of their singing was, "Earth, it is well!" | 11 | ····/˘····· |
| And all of their dancing was, "Life, thou art good!" | 11 | ····/˘····· |
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.