The time of the Mariage
Thou art repriv'd old yeare, thou shalt not die,Though thou upon thy death bed lye,And should'st within five dayes expire,Yet thou art rescu'd by a mightier fire,Then thy old Soule, the Sunne,When he doth in his largest circle runne.The passage of the West or East would thaw,And open wide their easie liquid jaweTo all our ships, could a Promethean artEither unto the Northerne Pole impartThe fire of these inflaming eyes, or of this loving heart.
Words in this poem
- shalt
- 2d per. sing. of Shall.
- thaw v. i.
- To melt, dissolve, or become fluid; to soften; -- said of that which is frozen; as, the ice thaws.
- promethean a.
- Of or pertaining to Prometheus. See Prometheus. [L. Promethus: cf. F. prométhéen.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The time of the Mariage is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of John Donne, Volume 1 (of 2) Edited from the Old Editions and Numerous Manuscripts, Project Gutenberg ebook #48688; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: John Donne, The time of the Mariage, in Poems (1633), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #48688, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/donne-poems/the-time-of-the-mariage.html, id L04942.
Form and metre
The time of the Mariage is 11 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 91% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter.
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 AABBCCDDEEE dieA · lyeA · expireB · fireB · sunneC · runneC · thawD · jaweD · artE · impartE · heartE
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Thou art repriv'd old yeare, thou shalt not die, | 10 | ·········· |
| Though thou upon thy death bed lye, | 8 | ········ |
| And should'st within five dayes expire, | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Yet thou art rescu'd by a mightier fire, | 10 | ···/˘··/˘/ |
| Then thy old Soule, the Sunne, | 6 | ······ |
| When he doth in his largest circle runne. | 10 | ·····/˘/˘· |
| The passage of the West or East would thaw, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| And open wide their easie liquid jawe | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| To all our ships, could a Promethean art | 11 | ··/···˘/˘˘· |
| Either unto the Northerne Pole impart | 10 | /˘······˘/ |
| The fire of these inflaming eyes, or of this loving heart. | 14 | ·/··˘/˘····/˘· |
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.