Three Miles to Penn
To-day I walked three miles to PennWith an uneasy mind.The sun shone like a frozen eye,A light that had gone blind,The glassy air between the skyAnd earth was frozen wind--All motion and all light againWere closed within a rind,As I by wood and field to PennTook trouble in my mind.
The slopes of cloud in heaven that lay,Unpeopled hills grown old,Had no more movement than the landLocked in a flowing mould;The sheep like mounds of cloudy sandStood soundless in the cold;There was no stir on all the waySave what my heart did hold,So quiet earth and heaven lay,So quiet and so old.
Words in this poem
- penn v. t.
- To write; to compose and commit to paper; to indite; to compose; as, to pen a sonnet.
- mould n.
- Crumbling, soft, friable earth; esp., earth containing the remains or constituents of organic matter, and suited to the growth of plants; soil. [OE. molde, AS. molde; akin to D. mul, G. mull, mulm, OHG. molt, molta, Icel. mold, Dan. muld, Sw. mull, Goth. mulda, and E. meal flour. See Meal, and cf. Mole a]
- soundless a.
- Not capable of being sounded or fathomed; unfathomable.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Three Miles to Penn is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sonnets and Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #56244; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Eleanor Farjeon, Three Miles to Penn, in Sonnets and Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #56244, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/farjeon-sonnets-poems/three-miles-to-penn.html, id L21987.
Form and metre
Three Miles to Penn is 20 lines in 2 stanzas of 10 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABCBCBABAB. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
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 ABCBCBABAB pennA · mindB · eyeC · blindB · skyC · windB · againA · rindB · pennA · mindB
- 2 ABCBCBABAB layA · oldB · landC · mouldB · sandC · coldB · wayA · holdB · layA · oldB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| To-day I walked three miles to Penn | 8 | ········ |
| With an uneasy mind. | 6 | ··˘/˘· |
| The sun shone like a frozen eye, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| A light that had gone blind, | 6 | ······ |
| The glassy air between the sky | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| And earth was frozen wind-- | 6 | ···/˘· |
| All motion and all light again | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| Were closed within a rind, | 6 | ······ |
| As I by wood and field to Penn | 8 | ········ |
| Took trouble in my mind. | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| The slopes of cloud in heaven that lay, | 8 | ·····/·· |
| Unpeopled hills grown old, | 5 | ····· |
| Had no more movement than the land | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Locked in a flowing mould; | 6 | ···/˘· |
| The sheep like mounds of cloudy sand | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Stood soundless in the cold; | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| There was no stir on all the way | 8 | ········ |
| Save what my heart did hold, | 6 | ······ |
| So quiet earth and heaven lay, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| So quiet and so old. | 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.