Behind
I saw an old man like a child,His blue eyes bright, his white hair wild,Who turned for ever, and might not stop,Round and round like an urchin's top.
'Fool,' I cried, 'while you spin round,'Others grow wise, are praised, are crowned.'Ever the same round road he trod,'This is better: I seek for God.'
'We see the whole world, left and right,Yet at the blind back hides from sightThe unseen Master that drives us forthTo East and West, to South and North.
'Over my shoulder for eighty yearsI have looked for the gleam of the sphere of spheres.''In all your turning, what have you found?''At least, I know why the world goes round.'
Words in this poem
- unseen a.
- Not seen or discovered.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Behind 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, Behind, in The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12037, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/chesterton-wild-knight/behind.html, id L17146.
Form and metre
Behind is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes AABB. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 77%). 90% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.6 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 19% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic 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 AABB childA · wildA · stopB · topB
- 2 AABB roundA · crownedA · trodB · godB
- 3 AABB rightA · sightA · forthB · northB
- 4 AABB yearsA · spheresA · foundB · roundB
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 tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| I saw an old man like a child, | 8 | ········ |
| His blue eyes bright, his white hair wild, | 8 | ········ |
| Who turned for ever, and might not stop, | 10 | ··˘·/˘···· |
| Round and round like an urchin's top. | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| 'Fool,' I cried, 'while you spin round, | 7 | ······· |
| 'Others grow wise, are praised, are crowned.' | 10 | /˘····˘··˘ |
| Ever the same round road he trod, | 8 | /˘······ |
| 'This is better: I seek for God.' | 8 | ··/˘···· |
| 'We see the whole world, left and right, | 8 | ········ |
| Yet at the blind back hides from sight | 8 | ········ |
| The unseen Master that drives us forth | 9 | ·˘//˘···· |
| To East and West, to South and North. | 8 | ········ |
| 'Over my shoulder for eighty years | 9 | ···/˘·/˘· |
| I have looked for the gleam of the sphere of spheres.' | 11 | ··········· |
| 'In all your turning, what have you found?' | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| 'At least, I know why the world goes round.' | 9 | ········· |
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.