Rex
The bard and mystic held me for their own,I filled the dream of sad, poetic maids,I took the friendly noble by the hand,I was the trustee of the hand-cart man,The brother of the fisher, porter, swain,And these from the crowd's edge well pleased beheldThe service done to me as done to them.
With the key of the secret he marches faster,From strength to strength, and for night brings day;While classes or tribes, too weak to masterThe flowing conditions of life, give way.
About this text
Rex is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems Household Edition, Project Gutenberg ebook #12843; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Rex, in Poems (1847), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #12843, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/emerson-poems/rex.html, id L07553.
Form and metre
Rex is 11 lines in 2 stanzas. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 81%). 92% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 18% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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.
- 2 ABAB fasterA · dayB · masterA · wayB
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 bard and mystic held me for their own, | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| I filled the dream of sad, poetic maids, | 10 | ······˘/˘· |
| I took the friendly noble by the hand, | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| I was the trustee of the hand-cart man, | 10 | ····/····· |
| The brother of the fisher, porter, swain, | 10 | ·/˘··/˘/˘· |
| And these from the crowd's edge well pleased beheld | 10 | ········˘/ |
| The service done to me as done to them. | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| With the key of the secret he marches faster, | 12 | ·····/˘·/˘/˘ |
| From strength to strength, and for night brings day; | 9 | ········· |
| While classes or tribes, too weak to master | 10 | ·/˘·····/˘ |
| The flowing conditions of life, give way. | 9 | ·/˘/˘···· |
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.