I never saw a moor
I never saw a moor,I never saw the sea;Yet know I how the heather looks,And what a wave must be.
I never spoke with God,Nor visited in heaven;Yet certain am I of the spotAs if the chart were given.
Words in this poem
- spoke n.
- The radius or ray of a wheel; one of the small bars which are inserted in the hub, or nave, and which serve to support the rim or felly. [OE. spoke, spake, AS, spaca; akin to D. speek, LG. speke, OHG. speihha, G. speiche. sq. root170. Cf. Spike a nail.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
I never saw a moor 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, I never saw a moor, in Poems (1890–1896), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12242, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/dickinson-poems/i-never-saw-a-moor.html, id L18918.
Form and metre
I never saw a moor is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is short measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 93%).
See other poems in short 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.
- 1 -A-A moor · seaA · looks · beA
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 short measure. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| I never saw a moor, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| I never saw the sea; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Yet know I how the heather looks, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And what a wave must be. | 6 | ······ |
| I never spoke with God, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Nor visited in heaven; | 7 | ·/˘˘·/˘ |
| Yet certain am I of the spot | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| As if the chart were given. | 7 | ·····/˘ |
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.