Winter
Clouded with snowThe cold winds blow,And shrill on leafless boughThe robin with its burning breastAlone sings now.
The rayless sun,Day's journey done,Sheds its last ebbing lightOn fields in leagues of beauty spreadUnearthly white.
Thick draws the dark,And spark by spark,The frost-fires kindle, and soonOver that sea of frozen foamFloats the white moon.
Words in this poem
- rayless a.
- Destitute of rays; hence, dark; not illuminated; blind; as, a rayless sky; rayless eyes.
- unearthly a.
- Not terrestrial; supernatural; preternatural; hence, weird; appalling; terrific; as, an unearthly sight or sound.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Winter is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Listeners and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #22569; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Walter de la Mare, Winter, in The Listeners and Other Poems (1912), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22569, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/de-la-mare-listeners/winter.html, id L17077.
Form and metre
Winter is 15 lines in 3 stanzas of 5 lines each. The metre is iambic dimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 5.2 syllables. 47% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic dimeter.
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 AAB-B snowA · blowA · boughB · breast · nowB
- 2 AAB-B sunA · doneA · lightB · spread · whiteB
- 3 AAB-B darkA · sparkA · soonB · foam · moonB
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 dimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Clouded with snow | 4 | /˘·· |
| The cold winds blow, | 4 | ···· |
| And shrill on leafless bough | 6 | ···/˘· |
| The robin with its burning breast | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Alone sings now. | 4 | ˘/·· |
| The rayless sun, | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Day's journey done, | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Sheds its last ebbing light | 6 | ···/˘· |
| On fields in leagues of beauty spread | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Unearthly white. | 4 | ˘/˘· |
| Thick draws the dark, | 4 | ···· |
| And spark by spark, | 4 | ···· |
| The frost-fires kindle, and soon | 7 | ··//˘·· |
| Over that sea of frozen foam | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Floats the white moon. | 4 | ···· |
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.