Alone
Blessings there are of cradle and of clan,Blessings that fall of priests' and princes' hands;But never blessing full of lives and lands,Broad as the blessing of a lonely man.
Though that old king fell from his primal throne,And ate among the cattle, yet this prideHad found him in the deepest grass, and criedAn 'Ecce Homo' with the trumpets blown.
And no mad tyrant, with almighty ban,Who in strong madness dreams himself divine,But hears through fumes of flattery and of wineThe thunder of this blessing name him man.
Let all earth rot past saints' and seraphs' plea,Yet shall a Voice cry through its last lost war,'This is the world, this red wreck of a star,That a man blessed beneath an alder-tree.'
Words in this poem
- primal a.
- First; primary; original; chief. [LL. primalis, fr. L. primus the first. See Prime, a.]
- trumpets n.
- A plant (Sarracenia flava) with long, hollow leaves.
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Alone is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Wild Knight and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #12037; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: G. K. Chesterton, Alone, in The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12037, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/chesterton-wild-knight/alone.html, id L17141.
Form and metre
Alone is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABBA, complete in 3 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.9 syllables. 19% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 clanA · handsB · landsB · manA
- 2 ABBA throneA · prideB · criedB · blownA
- 3 ABBA banA · divineB · wineB · manA
- 4 A--A pleaA · war · star · treeA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Blessings there are of cradle and of clan, | 10 | /˘···/˘··· |
| Blessings that fall of priests' and princes' hands; | 10 | /˘·····/˘· |
| But never blessing full of lives and lands, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| Broad as the blessing of a lonely man. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| Though that old king fell from his primal throne, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| And ate among the cattle, yet this pride | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Had found him in the deepest grass, and cried | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| An 'Ecce Homo' with the trumpets blown. | 9 | ··/˘··/˘· |
| And no mad tyrant, with almighty ban, | 10 | ···/˘·˘/˘· |
| Who in strong madness dreams himself divine, | 10 | ···/˘·˘/˘/ |
| But hears through fumes of flattery and of wine | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| The thunder of this blessing name him man. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| Let all earth rot past saints' and seraphs' plea, | 10 | ·········· |
| Yet shall a Voice cry through its last lost war, | 10 | ·········· |
| 'This is the world, this red wreck of a star, | 10 | ·········· |
| That a man blessed beneath an alder-tree.' | 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.