Sicilian Lullaby
Hush, little one, and fold your hands;The sun hath set, the moon is high;The sea is singing to the sands,And wakeful posies are beguiledBy many a fairy lullaby:Hush, little child, my little child!
Dream, little one, and in your dreamsFloat upward from this lowly place,--Float out on mellow, misty streamsTo lands where bideth Mary mild,And let her kiss thy little face,You little child, my little child!
Sleep, little one, and take thy rest,With angels bending over thee,--Sleep sweetly on that Father's breastWhom our dear Christ hath reconciled;But stay not there,--come back to me,O little child, my little child!
Words in this poem
- wakeful a.
- Not sleeping; indisposed to sleep; watchful; vigilant.
- lullaby n.
- A song to quiet babes or lull them to sleep; that which quiets. [From Lull, v. t.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sicilian Lullaby is in the public domain. This text is taken from A Little Book of Western Verse, Project Gutenberg ebook #9606; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Eugene Field, Sicilian Lullaby, in A Little Book of Western Verse (1889), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9606, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/field-western-verse/sicilian-lullaby.html, id L24656.
Form and metre
Sicilian Lullaby is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABACBC. 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 ABACBC handsA · highB · sandsA · beguiledC · lullabyB · childC
- 2 ABACBC dreamsA · placeB · streamsA · mildC · faceB · childC
- 3 ABACBC restA · theeB · breastA · reconciledC · meB · childC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Hush, little one, and fold your hands; | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| The sun hath set, the moon is high; | 8 | ········ |
| The sea is singing to the sands, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And wakeful posies are beguiled | 8 | ·/˘··˘/˘ |
| By many a fairy lullaby: | 8 | ·/·/˘/˘· |
| Hush, little child, my little child! | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Dream, little one, and in your dreams | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Float upward from this lowly place,-- | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Float out on mellow, misty streams | 8 | ···/˘/˘· |
| To lands where bideth Mary mild, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| And let her kiss thy little face, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| You little child, my little child! | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Sleep, little one, and take thy rest, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| With angels bending over thee,-- | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| Sleep sweetly on that Father's breast | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Whom our dear Christ hath reconciled; | 8 | ·/···/˘· |
| But stay not there,--come back to me, | 8 | ········ |
| O little child, my little child! | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
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.