Moritura
A song of the setting sun!The sky in the west is red,And the day is all but done:While yonder up overhead,All too soon,There rises, so cold, the cynic moon.
A song of a winter day!The wind of the north doth blow,From a sky that's chill and gray,On fields where no crops now grow,Fields long shornOf bearded barley and golden corn.
A song of an old, old man!His hairs are white and his gaze,Long bleared in his visage wan,With its weight of yesterdays,JoylesslyHe stands and mumbles and looks at me,
A song of a faded flower!'Twas plucked in the tender bud,And fair and fresh for an hour,In a lady's hair it stood.Now, ah, now,Faded it lies in the dust and low.
Words in this poem
- yonder adv.
- At a distance, but within view. [OE. yonder, ýonder; cf. OD. ginder, Goth. jaindr there. Yond, adv.]
- cynic a.
- Having the qualities of a surly dog; snarling; captious; currish. [L. cynicus of the sect of Cynics, fr. Gr. Hound.]
- bleared a.
- Dimmed, as by a watery humor; affected with rheum.
- visage n.
- The face, countenance, or look of a person or an animal; -- chiefly applied to the human face. [F. visage, from L. visus a seeing, a look, fr. videre, visum, to see. See Vision.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Moritura is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems and Prose of Ernest Dowson, With a Memoir by Arthur Symons, Project Gutenberg ebook #8497; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Ernest Dowson, Moritura, in The Poems of Ernest Dowson (1896–1899), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8497, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/dowson-poems/moritura.html, id L01687.
Form and metre
Moritura is 24 lines in 4 stanzas of 6 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABABCC, complete in 2 of its 4 stanzas. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 82%). 95% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.8 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 8% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See 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 ABABCC sunA · redB · doneA · overheadB · soonC · moonC
- 2 ABABCC dayA · blowB · grayA · growB · shornC · cornC
- 3 -A-A-- man · gazeA · wan · yesterdaysA · joylessly · me
- 4 ABAB-- flowerA · budB · hourA · stoodB · now · low
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 |
|---|---|---|
| A song of the setting sun! | 7 | ····/˘· |
| The sky in the west is red, | 7 | ······· |
| And the day is all but done: | 7 | ······· |
| While yonder up overhead, | 7 | ·/˘·/˘/ |
| All too soon, | 3 | ··· |
| There rises, so cold, the cynic moon. | 9 | ·/˘···/˘· |
| A song of a winter day! | 7 | ····/˘· |
| The wind of the north doth blow, | 7 | ······· |
| From a sky that's chill and gray, | 7 | ······· |
| On fields where no crops now grow, | 7 | ······· |
| Fields long shorn | 3 | ··· |
| Of bearded barley and golden corn. | 9 | ·/˘/˘·/˘· |
| A song of an old, old man! | 7 | ······· |
| His hairs are white and his gaze, | 7 | ······· |
| Long bleared in his visage wan, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| With its weight of yesterdays, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| Joylessly | 3 | ··· |
| He stands and mumbles and looks at me, | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| A song of a faded flower! | 8 | ····/˘/˘ |
| 'Twas plucked in the tender bud, | 7 | ····/˘· |
| And fair and fresh for an hour, | 8 | ······/˘ |
| In a lady's hair it stood. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| Now, ah, now, | 3 | ··· |
| Faded it lies in the dust and low. | 9 | /˘······· |
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.