Birthright
Lord Rameses of Egypt sighedBecause a summer evening passed;And little Ariadne criedThat summer fancy fell at lastTo dust; and young Verona diedWhen beauty’s hour was overcast.
Theirs was the bitterness we knowBecause the clouds of hawthorn keepSo short a state, and kisses goTo tombs unfathomably deep,While Rameses and RomeoAnd little Ariadne sleep.
Words in this poem
- overcast v. t.
- To cast or cover over; hence, to cloud; to darken.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Birthright is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, 1908-1919, Project Gutenberg ebook #51575; 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 Drinkwater, Birthright, in Poems, 1908-1919 (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #51575, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/drinkwater-poems/birthright.html, id L23019.
Form and metre
Birthright is 12 lines in 2 stanzas of 6 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABABAB. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 96%).
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 ABABAB sighedA · passedB · criedA · lastB · diedA · overcastB
- 2 ABABAB knowA · keepB · goA · deepB · romeoA · sleepB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Lord Rameses of Egypt sighed | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Because a summer evening passed; | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| And little Ariadne cried | 8 | ·/˘·˘/˘· |
| That summer fancy fell at last | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| To dust; and young Verona died | 8 | ····˘/˘· |
| When beauty’s hour was overcast. | 8 | ·/˘/·/˘· |
| Theirs was the bitterness we know | 8 | ···/˘˘·· |
| Because the clouds of hawthorn keep | 8 | ·····/·· |
| So short a state, and kisses go | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| To tombs unfathomably deep, | 8 | ········ |
| While Rameses and Romeo | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| And little Ariadne sleep. | 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.