On a Heath
I COULD hear a gown-skirt rustlingBefore I could see her shape,Rustling through the heatherThat wove the common’s drape,On that evening of dark weatherWhen I hearkened, lips agape.
And the town-shine in the distanceDid but baffle here the sight,And then a voice flew forward:“Dear, is’t you? I fear the night!”And the herons flapped to norwardIn the firs upon my right.
There was another loomingWhose life we did not see;There was one stilly bloomingFull nigh to where walked we;There was a shade entombingAll that was bright of me.
Words in this poem
- wove
- p. pr. & rare vb. n. of Weave.
- drape v. t.
- To cover or adorn with drapery or folds of cloth, or as with drapery; as, to drape a bust, a building, etc. [F. draper, fr. drap cloth. See 3d Drab.]
- agape adv.
- Gaping, as with wonder, expectation, or eager attention. [Pref. a- + gape.]
- baffle v. i.
- To cause to undergo a disgraceful punishment, as a recreant knight. [Cf. Lowland Scotch bauchle to treat contemptuously, bauch tasteless, abashed, jaded, Icel. bagr uneasy, poor, or bagr, n., struggle, bægja to push, treat harshl]
- looming n.
- The indistinct and magnified appearance of objects seen in particular states of the atmosphere. See Mirage.
- stilly a.
- Still; quiet; calm.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
On a Heath is in the public domain. This text is taken from Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses, Project Gutenberg ebook #3255; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Thomas Hardy, On a Heath, in Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3255, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hardy-moments-of-vision/on-a-heath.html, id L24149.
Form and metre
On a Heath is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%).
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 -ABABA rustling · shapeA · heatherB · drapeA · weatherB · agapeA
- 2 -ABABA distance · sightA · forwardB · nightA · norwardB · rightA
- 3 ABABAB loomingA · seeB · bloomingA · weB · entombingA · meB
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I COULD hear a gown-skirt rustling | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Before I could see her shape, | 7 | ······· |
| Rustling through the heather | 6 | /˘··/˘ |
| That wove the common’s drape, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| On that evening of dark weather | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| When I hearkened, lips agape. | 8 | ····˘·˘/ |
| And the town-shine in the distance | 8 | ······/˘ |
| Did but baffle here the sight, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| And then a voice flew forward: | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| “Dear, is’t you? I fear the night!” | 7 | ······· |
| And the herons flapped to norward | 8 | ··/˘··/˘ |
| In the firs upon my right. | 7 | ······· |
| There was another looming | 7 | ··˘/˘/˘ |
| Whose life we did not see; | 6 | ······ |
| There was one stilly blooming | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| Full nigh to where walked we; | 7 | ·····˘· |
| There was a shade entombing | 7 | ····˘/˘ |
| All that was bright of me. | 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.