Wanderers
Wide are the meadows of night,And daisies are shining there,Tossing their lovely dews,Lustrous and fair;And through these sweet fields go,Wanderers amid the stars --Venus, Mercury, Uranus, Neptune,Saturn, Jupiter, Mars.
'Tired in their silver, they move,And circling, whisper and say,Fair are the blossoming meads of delightThrough which we stray.
A little sound ---Only a little, a little ---The breath in a reed,A trembling fiddle;A trumpet's ring,The shuddering drum;So all the glory, bravery, hushOf music come.
A little sound ---Only a stir and a sighOf each green leafIts fluttering neighbor by;Oak on to oak,The wide dark forest through ---So o'er the watery wheeling worldThe night winds go.
A little sound,Only a little, a little ---The thin high droneOf the simmering kettle,The gathering frost,The click of needle and thread;Mother, the fading wall, the dream,The drowsy bed.
Words in this poem
- amid prep.
- In the midst or middle of; surrounded or encompassed by; among. [OE. amidde, amiddes, on midden, AS. on middan, in the middle, fr. midde the middle. The s is an adverbial ending, originally marking the genitive; the t is a la]
- uranus n.
- The son or husband of Gaia (Earth), and father of Chronos (Time) and the Titans. [L. Uranus, Gr. O'yrano`s Uranus, o'yrano`s heaven, sky. Cf. Uranium.]
- wheeling n.
- The act of conveying anything, or traveling, on wheels, or in a wheeled vehicle.
- kettle n.
- A metallic vessel, with a wide mouth, often without a cover, used for heating and boiling water or other liguids. Kettle pins, ninepins; skittles. Shelton. [OE. ketel; cf. AS. cetel, cetil, cytel; akin to D. kjedel, G. kessel, OHG. chezzil, Icel. ketill, SW. kittel, Dan. kjedel, Goth. katils; all perh. fr. L. catill]
- fading n.
- An Irish dance; also, the burden of a song.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Wanderers is in the public domain. This text is taken from Peacock Pie, a Book of Rhymes, Project Gutenberg ebook #3753; 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, Wanderers, in Peacock Pie (1913), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3753, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/de-la-mare-peacock-pie/wanderers.html, id L12627.
Form and metre
Wanderers is 36 lines in 5 stanzas. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic trimeter. 86% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 5.9 syllables. 5 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 17% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 -A-A-B-B night · thereA · dews · fairA · go · starsB · neptune · marsB
- 2 -A-A move · sayA · delight · strayA
- 3 -----A-A sound · little · reed · fiddle · ring · drumA · hush · comeA
- 4 -A-A---- sound · sighA · leaf · byA · oak · through · world · go
- 5 -----A-A sound · little · drone · kettle · frost · threadA · dream · bedA
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Wide are the meadows of night, | 7 | ···/··· |
| And daisies are shining there, | 7 | ·/˘·/˘· |
| Tossing their lovely dews, | 6 | /˘·/˘· |
| Lustrous and fair; | 4 | /˘·· |
| And through these sweet fields go, | 6 | ······ |
| Wanderers amid the stars -- | 6 | /˘˘/·· |
| Venus, Mercury, Uranus, Neptune, | 8 | /˘/˘/˘/˘ |
| Saturn, Jupiter, Mars. | 6 | /˘/˘˘· |
| 'Tired in their silver, they move, | 7 | /··/˘·· |
| And circling, whisper and say, | 7 | ·/˘/˘·· |
| Fair are the blossoming meads of delight | 9 | ···/˘··˘/ |
| Through which we stray. | 4 | ···· |
| A little sound --- | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Only a little, a little --- | 8 | /˘·/˘·/˘ |
| The breath in a reed, | 5 | ····· |
| A trembling fiddle; | 6 | ·/˘˘/˘ |
| A trumpet's ring, | 4 | ·/˘· |
| The shuddering drum; | 5 | ·/˘˘· |
| So all the glory, bravery, hush | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| Of music come. | 4 | ·/˘· |
| A little sound --- | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Only a stir and a sigh | 7 | /˘····· |
| Of each green leaf | 4 | ···· |
| Its fluttering neighbor by; | 6 | ·/˘/˘· |
| Oak on to oak, | 4 | ···· |
| The wide dark forest through --- | 6 | ···/˘· |
| So o'er the watery wheeling world | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| The night winds go. | 4 | ···· |
| A little sound, | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Only a little, a little --- | 8 | /˘·/˘·/˘ |
| The thin high drone | 4 | ···· |
| Of the simmering kettle, | 7 | ··/˘˘/˘ |
| The gathering frost, | 5 | ·/˘˘· |
| The click of needle and thread; | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| Mother, the fading wall, the dream, | 8 | /˘·/˘··· |
| The drowsy bed. | 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.