Moonrise
Where are you going, you pretty riders?--To the moon’s rising, the rising of death’s moon,Where the waters move not, and birds are still and songless,Soon, very soon.
Where are you faring to, you proud Hectors?Through battle, out of battle, under the grass,Dust behind your hoof-beats rises, and into dust,Clouded, you pass.
I’m a pretty rider, I’m a proud Hector,I as you a little am pretty and proud;I with you am riding, riding to the moonrise,So sing we loud--
“Out beyond the dust lies mystery of moonrise,We go to chiller learning than is bred in the sun,Hectors, and riders, and a simple singer,Riding as one.”
Words in this poem
- songless a.
- Destitute of the power of song; without song; as, songless birds; songless woods.
- moonrise n.
- The rising of the moon above the horizon; also, the time of its rising.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Moonrise 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, Moonrise, in Poems, 1908-1919 (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #51575, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/drinkwater-poems/moonrise.html, id L23136.
Form and metre
Moonrise is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is trochaic hexameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 73%).
See other poems in trochaic 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 -A-A riders · moonA · songless · soonA
- 2 -A-A hectors · grassA · dust · passA
- 3 -A-A hector · proudA · moonrise · loudA
- 4 -A-A moonrise · sunA · singer · oneA
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 trochaic hexameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Where are you going, you pretty riders?-- | 9 | ···/·/˘/˘ |
| To the moon’s rising, the rising of death’s moon, | 11 | ···/˘·/˘··· |
| Where the waters move not, and birds are still and songless, | 13 | ··/˘·······/˘ |
| Soon, very soon. | 4 | ·/˘· |
| Where are you faring to, you proud Hectors? | 10 | ···/˘···/˘ |
| Through battle, out of battle, under the grass, | 11 | ·/˘··/˘···· |
| Dust behind your hoof-beats rises, and into dust, | 12 | ······/˘···· |
| Clouded, you pass. | 4 | /˘·· |
| I’m a pretty rider, I’m a proud Hector, | 10 | ··/˘/···/˘ |
| I as you a little am pretty and proud; | 11 | ····/˘·/˘·· |
| I with you am riding, riding to the moonrise, | 12 | ····/˘/˘··/˘ |
| So sing we loud-- | 4 | ···· |
| “Out beyond the dust lies mystery of moonrise, | 11 | ······/˘·/˘ |
| We go to chiller learning than is bred in the sun, | 13 | ···/˘/˘······ |
| Hectors, and riders, and a simple singer, | 10 | /˘·/··/˘/˘ |
| Riding as one.” | 4 | /˘·· |
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.