Amour 27
My Loue makes hote the fire whose heat is spent,The water moisture from my teares deriueth,And my strong sighes the ayres weake force reuiueth:Thus loue, tears, sighes, maintaine each one his element.The fire, vnto my loue, compare a painted fire,The water, to my teares as drops to Oceans be,The ayre, vnto my sighes as Eagle to the flie,The passions of dispaire but ioyes to my desire.Onely my loue is in the fire ingraued,Onely my teares by Oceans may be gessed,Onely my sighes are by the ayre expressed;Yet fire, water, ayre, of nature not depriued.Whilst fire, water, ayre, twixt heauen and earth shal be,My loue, my teares, my sighes, extinguisht cannot be.
Words in this poem
- hote v. t.
- To command; to enjoin. Piers Plowman.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Amour 27 is in the public domain. This text is taken from Minor Poems of Michael Drayton, Project Gutenberg ebook #17873; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Michael Drayton, Amour 27, in Minor Poems (1594–1619), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #17873, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/drayton-minor-poems/amour-27.html, id L20568.
Form and metre
Amour 27 is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic hexameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 88%).
See other poems in iambic hexameter.
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 ABBACD-C----DD spentA · deriuethB · reuiuethB · elementA · fireC · beD · flie · desireC · ingraued · gessed · expressed · depriued · beD · beD
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 hexameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| My Loue makes hote the fire whose heat is spent, | 10 | ·····/···· |
| The water moisture from my teares deriueth, | 10 | ·/˘/˘····· |
| And my strong sighes the ayres weake force reuiueth: | 9 | ········· |
| Thus loue, tears, sighes, maintaine each one his element. | 11 | ·········/˘ |
| The fire, vnto my loue, compare a painted fire, | 11 | ·/···˘/·/˘/ |
| The water, to my teares as drops to Oceans be, | 12 | ·/˘······/˘· |
| The ayre, vnto my sighes as Eagle to the flie, | 11 | ······/˘··· |
| The passions of dispaire but ioyes to my desire. | 12 | ·/˘·······˘/ |
| Onely my loue is in the fire ingraued, | 10 | /˘·····/˘· |
| Onely my teares by Oceans may be gessed, | 10 | /˘···/˘··· |
| Onely my sighes are by the ayre expressed; | 10 | /˘······˘/ |
| Yet fire, water, ayre, of nature not depriued. | 10 | ·//˘··/˘·· |
| Whilst fire, water, ayre, twixt heauen and earth shal be, | 11 | ·//˘······· |
| My loue, my teares, my sighes, extinguisht cannot be. | 12 | ·········/˘· |
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.