At half-past three a single bird
At half-past three a single birdUnto a silent skyPropounded but a single termOf cautious melody.
At half-past four, experimentHad subjugated test,And lo! her silver principleSupplanted all the rest.
At half-past seven, elementNor implement was seen,And place was where the presence was,Circumference between.
About this text
At half-past three a single bird 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, At half-past three a single bird, in Poems (1890–1896), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12242, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/dickinson-poems/at-half-past-three-a-single-bird.html, id L18972.
Form and metre
At half-past three a single bird is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
See other poems in common measure.
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.
- 2 -A-A experiment · testA · principle · restA
- 3 -A-A element · seenA · was · betweenA
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 common measure. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| At half-past three a single bird | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Unto a silent sky | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Propounded but a single term | 8 | ˘/˘··/˘· |
| Of cautious melody. | 6 | ·/˘/˘˘ |
| At half-past four, experiment | 8 | ····˘/˘˘ |
| Had subjugated test, | 6 | ·/˘·˘· |
| And lo! her silver principle | 8 | ···/˘/˘˘ |
| Supplanted all the rest. | 6 | ˘/˘··· |
| At half-past seven, element | 8 | ···/˘/˘˘ |
| Nor implement was seen, | 6 | ·/˘˘·· |
| And place was where the presence was, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Circumference between. | 5 | ˘/˘·· |
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.