Spleen
Around were all the roses red,The ivy all around was black.
Dear, so thou only move thine head,Shall all mine old despairs awake!
Too blue, too tender was the sky,The air too soft, too green the sea.
Always I fear, I know not why,Some lamentable flight from thee.
I am so tired of holly-spraysAnd weary of the bright box-tree,
Of all the endless country ways;Of everything alas! save thee.
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Spleen 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, Spleen, in The Poems of Ernest Dowson (1896–1899), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #8497, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/dowson-poems/spleen-2.html, id L01672.
Form and metre
Spleen is 12 lines in 6 stanzas of 2 lines each. The commonest rhyme scheme is BC, in 2 of the 6 stanzas; the rest vary or could not be confirmed. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%). 96% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.2 syllables. 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 A- redA · black
- 2 A- headA · awake
- 3 BC skyB · seaC
- 4 BC whyB · theeC
- 5 DC spraysD · treeC
- 6 DC waysD · theeC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Around were all the roses red, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| The ivy all around was black. | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Dear, so thou only move thine head, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Shall all mine old despairs awake! | 8 | ····˘/˘/ |
| Too blue, too tender was the sky, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The air too soft, too green the sea. | 8 | ········ |
| Always I fear, I know not why, | 8 | /······· |
| Some lamentable flight from thee. | 8 | ·˘/˘˘··· |
| I am so tired of holly-sprays | 10 | ···/˘˘·/˘· |
| And weary of the bright box-tree, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Of all the endless country ways; | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| Of everything alas! save thee. | 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.