Christmas
Black is the sky and white the ground.O ring, ye bells, your carol's grace!The Child is born! A love profoundBeams o'er Him from His Mother's face.
No silken woof of costly showKeeps off the bitter cold from Him.But spider-webs have drooped them low,To be His curtain soft and dim.
Now trembles on the straw downspreadThe Little Child, the Star beneath.To warm Him in His holy bed,Upon Him ox and ass do breathe.
Snow hangs its fringes on the byre.The roof stands open to the trystOf aureoled saints, that sweetly choirTo shepherds, "Come, behold the Christ!"
Words in this poem
- byre n.
- A cow house. [N. of Eng.& Scot.] [Cf, Icel. bür pantry, Sw. bur cage,Dan. buur, E.bower.]
- tryst v. i.
- To mutually agree to meet at a certain place.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Christmas is in the public domain. This text is taken from Enamels and Cameos and Other Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #29521, the Agnes Lee translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Théophile Gautier, Christmas, in Enamels and Cameos and Other Poems (1903), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #29521, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/gautier-enamels-cameos/christmas.html, id L27022.
Form and metre
Christmas is 16 lines in 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABAB. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 93%).
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 ABAB groundA · graceB · profoundA · faceB
- 2 ABAB showA · himB · lowA · dimB
- 3 ABAB downspreadA · beneathB · bedA · breatheB
- 4 ABAB byreA · trystB · choirA · christB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Black is the sky and white the ground. | 8 | ········ |
| O ring, ye bells, your carol's grace! | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| The Child is born! A love profound | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Beams o'er Him from His Mother's face. | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| No silken woof of costly show | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Keeps off the bitter cold from Him. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| But spider-webs have drooped them low, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| To be His curtain soft and dim. | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Now trembles on the straw downspread | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| The Little Child, the Star beneath. | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| To warm Him in His holy bed, | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Upon Him ox and ass do breathe. | 8 | ········ |
| Snow hangs its fringes on the byre. | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| The roof stands open to the tryst | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Of aureoled saints, that sweetly choir | 8 | ·/˘··/˘/ |
| To shepherds, "Come, behold the Christ!" | 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.