Evening
The moon begins her stately rideAcross the summer sky;The happy wavelets lash the shore,--The tide is rising high.
Beneath some friendly blade of grassThe lazy beetle cowers;The coffers of the air are filledWith offerings from the flowers.
And slowly buzzing o'er my headA swallow wings her flight;I hear the weary plowman singAs falls the restful night.
Words in this poem
- restful a.
- Being at rest; quiet.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Evening is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar, Project Gutenberg ebook #18338; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Paul Laurence Dunbar, Evening, in The Complete Poems (1893–1905), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #18338, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/dunbar-poems/evening.html, id L00882.
Form and metre
Evening is 12 lines in 3 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 95%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.3 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 42% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in common measure.
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 ride · skyA · shore · highA
- 2 -A-A grass · cowersA · filled · flowersA
- 3 -A-A head · flightA · sing · nightA
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 common measure. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The moon begins her stately ride | 8 | ··˘/·/˘· |
| Across the summer sky; | 6 | ˘/·/˘· |
| The happy wavelets lash the shore,-- | 9 | ·/˘······ |
| The tide is rising high. | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Beneath some friendly blade of grass | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| The lazy beetle cowers; | 7 | ·/˘/˘/˘ |
| The coffers of the air are filled | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| With offerings from the flowers. | 8 | ·/˘˘··/˘ |
| And slowly buzzing o'er my head | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| A swallow wings her flight; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| I hear the weary plowman sing | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| As falls the restful night. | 6 | ···/˘· |
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.