Love in October
The fields, the clouds, the farms and farming gear,The drifting kine, the scarlet apple trees ...Not of the sun but separate are these,And individual joys, and very dear;Yet when the sun is folded, they are hereNo more, the drifting skies: the argosiesOf wagoned apples: still societiesOf elms: red cattle on the stubbled year.
So are you not love’s whole estate. I oweIn many hearts more dues than I shall pay;Yet is your heart the spring of all love’s light,And should your love weary of me and goWith all its thriving beams out of my day,These many loves would founder in that night.
Words in this poem
- stubbled a.
- Covered with stubble.
- 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
Love in October 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, Love in October, in Poems, 1908-1919 (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #51575, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/drinkwater-poems/love-in-october.html, id L23069.
Form and metre
Love in October is 14 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 90%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 ABBAABBA gearA · treesB · theseB · dearA · hereA · argosiesB · societiesB · yearA
- 2 ABCABC oweA · payB · lightC · goA · dayB · nightC
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The fields, the clouds, the farms and farming gear, | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| The drifting kine, the scarlet apple trees ... | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| Not of the sun but separate are these, | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| And individual joys, and very dear; | 10 | ··˘/˘··/˘· |
| Yet when the sun is folded, they are here | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| No more, the drifting skies: the argosies | 10 | ···/˘··/˘˘ |
| Of wagoned apples: still societies | 10 | ·/˘/˘·˘/˘˘ |
| Of elms: red cattle on the stubbled year. | 10 | ···/˘··/˘· |
| So are you not love’s whole estate. I owe | 10 | ······˘/·· |
| In many hearts more dues than I shall pay; | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Yet is your heart the spring of all love’s light, | 10 | ·········· |
| And should your love weary of me and go | 10 | ····/˘···· |
| With all its thriving beams out of my day, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| These many loves would founder in that night. | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
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.