To the Ghost of Robert Wisdome
Thou, once a body, now but aire,Arch-botcher of a psalme or prayer,From Carfax come;And patch mee up a zealous lay,With an old ever and for ay,Or, all and some.Or such a spirit lend mee,As may a hymne downe send mee,To purge my braine:So, Robert, looke behind thee,Least Turke or Pope doe find thee,And goe to bed againe.
About this text
To the Ghost of Robert Wisdome is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Richard Corbet, late bishop of Oxford and of Norwich 4th edition, Project Gutenberg ebook #65375; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Richard Corbet, To the Ghost of Robert Wisdome, in Poems (1647), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #65375, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/corbet-poems/to-the-ghost-of-robert-wisdome.html, id L08915.
Form and metre
To the Ghost of Robert Wisdome is 12 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes AABCCBDDEDDE. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.5 syllables.
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 AABCCBDDEDDE aireA · prayerA · comeB · layC · ayC · someB · meeD · meeD · braineE · theeD · theeD · againeE
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Thou, once a body, now but aire, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Arch-botcher of a psalme or prayer, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| From Carfax come; | 4 | ···· |
| And patch mee up a zealous lay, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| With an old ever and for ay, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Or, all and some. | 4 | ···· |
| Or such a spirit lend mee, | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| As may a hymne downe send mee, | 7 | ······· |
| To purge my braine: | 4 | ···· |
| So, Robert, looke behind thee, | 7 | ·/˘···· |
| Least Turke or Pope doe find thee, | 7 | ······· |
| And goe to bed againe. | 6 | ······ |
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.