Where They Lived
DISHEVELLED leaves creep downUpon that bank to-day,Some green, some yellow, and some pale brown;The wet bents bob and sway;The once warm slippery turf is soddenWhere we laughingly sat or lay.
The summerhouse is gone,Leaving a weedy space;The bushes that veiled it once have grownGaunt trees that interlace,Through whose lank limbs I see too clearlyThe nakedness of the place.
And where were hills of blue,Blind drifts of vapour blow,And the names of former dwellers few,If any, people know,And instead of a voice that called, “Come in, Dears,”Time calls, “Pass below!”
Words in this poem
- laughingly adv.
- With laughter or merriment.
- summerhouse n.
- A rustic house or apartment in a garden or park, to be used as a pleasure resort in summer.
- weedy a.
- Of or pertaining to weeds; consisting of weeds.
- veiled a.
- Covered by, or as by, a veil; hidden.
- gaunt a.
- Attenuated, as with fasting or suffering; lean; meager; pinched and grim. [Cf. Norw. gand a thin pointed stick, a tall and thin man, and W. gwan weak.]
- nakedness n.
- The condition of being naked.
- vapour n.
- Any substance in the gaseous, or aëriform, state, the condition of which is ordinarily that of a liquid or solid. [OE. vapour, OF. vapour, vapor, vapeur, F. vapeur, L. vapor; probably for cvapor, and akin to Gr. kvepti to breathe, smell, Russ. kopote fine soot. Cf. Vapid.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Where They Lived 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, Where They Lived, in Moments of Vision and Miscellaneous Verses (1917), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #3255, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hardy-moments-of-vision/where-they-lived.html, id L24136.
Form and metre
Where They Lived is 18 lines in 3 stanzas of 6 lines each. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 85%).
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
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 ABABAB downA · dayB · brownA · swayB · soddenA · layB
- 2 -A-A-A gone · spaceA · grown · interlaceA · clearly · placeA
- 3 ABAB-B blueA · blowB · fewA · knowB · dears · belowB
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 trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| DISHEVELLED leaves creep down | 6 | ˘/˘··· |
| Upon that bank to-day, | 6 | ······ |
| Some green, some yellow, and some pale brown; | 9 | ···/˘···· |
| The wet bents bob and sway; | 6 | ······ |
| The once warm slippery turf is sodden | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| Where we laughingly sat or lay. | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| The summerhouse is gone, | 6 | ·/˘˘·· |
| Leaving a weedy space; | 6 | /˘·/˘· |
| The bushes that veiled it once have grown | 9 | ·/˘······ |
| Gaunt trees that interlace, | 6 | ····˘/ |
| Through whose lank limbs I see too clearly | 9 | ·······/˘ |
| The nakedness of the place. | 7 | ·/˘˘··· |
| And where were hills of blue, | 6 | ······ |
| Blind drifts of vapour blow, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| And the names of former dwellers few, | 9 | ····/˘/˘· |
| If any, people know, | 6 | ·/˘/˘· |
| And instead of a voice that called, “Come in, Dears,” | 11 | ·˘/········ |
| Time calls, “Pass below!” | 5 | ····· |
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.