April
An altered look about the hills;A Tyrian light the village fills;A wider sunrise in the dawn;A deeper twilight on the lawn;A print of a vermilion foot;A purple finger on the slope;A flippant fly upon the pane;A spider at his trade again;An added strut in chanticleer;A flower expected everywhere;An axe shrill singing in the woods;Fern-odors on untravelled roads, --All this, and more I cannot tell,A furtive look you know as well,And Nicodemus' mysteryReceives its annual reply.
Words in this poem
- tyrian a.
- Of or pertaining to Tyre or its people.
- flippant a.
- Of smooth, fluent, and rapid speech; speaking with ease and rapidity; having a voluble tongue; talkative. [Prov. E. flip to move nimbly; cf. W. llipa soft, limber, pliant, or Icel. fleipa to babble, prattle. Cf. Flip, Fillip, Flap, Flipper.]
- pane n.
- The narrow edge of a hammer head. See Peen. [F. panne.]
- chanticleer n.
- A cock, so called from the clearness or loundness of his voice in crowing. [F. Chanteclair, name of the cock in the Roman du Renart (Reynard the Fox); chanter to chant + clair clear. See Chant, and Clear.]
- furtive a.
- Stolen; obtained or characterized by stealth; sly; secret; stealthy; as, a furtive look. Prior. [L. furtivus, fr. furtum theft, fr. fur thief, akin to ferre to bear: cf. F. furtif. See Fertile.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
April is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems by Emily Dickinson, Three Series, Complete, Project Gutenberg ebook #12242; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Emily Dickinson, April, in Poems (1890–1896), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12242, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/dickinson-poems/april.html, id L03680.
Form and metre
April is 16 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%). 89% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.8 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 6% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, 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--CC----DD-- hillsA · fillsA · dawnB · lawnB · foot · slope · paneC · againC · chanticleer · everywhere · woods · roads · tellD · wellD · mystery · reply
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 |
|---|---|---|
| An altered look about the hills; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| A Tyrian light the village fills; | 9 | ·/˘˘··/˘· |
| A wider sunrise in the dawn; | 8 | ·/˘/···· |
| A deeper twilight on the lawn; | 8 | ·/˘/···· |
| A print of a vermilion foot; | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| A purple finger on the slope; | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| A flippant fly upon the pane; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| A spider at his trade again; | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| An added strut in chanticleer; | 8 | ·/˘··/˘˘ |
| A flower expected everywhere; | 8 | ·/˘/˘/˘· |
| An axe shrill singing in the woods; | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Fern-odors on untravelled roads, -- | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| All this, and more I cannot tell, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| A furtive look you know as well, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| And Nicodemus' mystery | 8 | ·····/˘˘ |
| Receives its annual reply. | 8 | ˘/·/˘˘˘/ |
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.