In Death Divided
I SHALL rot here, with those whom in their dayYou never knew,And alien ones who, ere they chilled to clay,Met not my view,Will in your distant grave-place ever neighbour you.
No shade of pinnacle or tree or tower,While earth endures,Will fall on my mound and within the hourSteal on to yours;One robin never haunt our two green covertures.
Some organ may resound on Sunday noonsBy where you lie,Some other thrill the panes with other tunesWhere moulder I;No selfsame chords compose our common lullaby.
The simply-cut memorial at my headPerhaps may takeA Gothic form, and that above your bedBe Greek in make;No linking symbol show thereon for our tale’s sake.
And in the monotonous moils of strained, hard-runHumanity,The eternal tie which binds us twain in oneNo eye will seeStretching across the miles that sever you from me.
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- chilled a.
- Hardened on the surface or edge by chilling; as, chilled iron; a chilled wheel.
- neighbour v. i.
- To dwell in the vicinity; to be a neighbor, or in the neighborhood; to be near.
- pinnacle n.
- An architectural member, upright, and generally ending in a small spire, -- used to finish a buttress, to constitute a part in a proportion, as where pinnacles flank a gable or spire, and the like. [OE. pinacle, F. pinacle, L. pinnaculum, fr. pinna pinnacle, feather. See Pin a peg.]
- moulder n.
- One who, or that which, molds or forms into shape; specifically (Founding), one skilled in the art of making molds for castings.
- selfsame a.
- Precisely the same; the very same; identical. [Self, a. + same.]
- lullaby n.
- A song to quiet babes or lull them to sleep; that which quiets. [From Lull, v. t.]
- thereon adv.
- On that or this. [AS. . See There, and On.]
- twain a.
- Two;- nearly obsolete in common discourse, but used in poetry and burlesque. [OE. twein, tweien, tweyne, AS. twegen, masc. See Two.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
In Death Divided is in the public domain. This text is taken from Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries, with Miscellaneous Pieces, Project Gutenberg ebook #2863; 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, In Death Divided, in Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries (1914), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #2863, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hardy-satires/in-death-divided.html, id L24012.
Form and metre
In Death Divided is 25 lines in 5 stanzas of 5 lines each. The rhyme scheme is ABABB, complete in 3 of its 5 stanzas. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter.
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 ABABB dayA · knewB · clayA · viewB · youB
- 2 ABAB- towerA · enduresB · hourA · yoursB · covertures
- 3 ABABB noonsA · lieB · tunesA · iB · lullabyB
- 4 ABABB headA · takeB · bedA · makeB · sakeB
- 5 A-ABB runA · humanity · oneA · seeB · 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 SHALL rot here, with those whom in their day | 10 | ·········· |
| You never knew, | 4 | ·/˘· |
| And alien ones who, ere they chilled to clay, | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Met not my view, | 4 | ···· |
| Will in your distant grave-place ever neighbour you. | 11 | ···/˘··//˘· |
| No shade of pinnacle or tree or tower, | 9 | ···/˘···/ |
| While earth endures, | 4 | ··˘/ |
| Will fall on my mound and within the hour | 10 | ·········/ |
| Steal on to yours; | 4 | ···· |
| One robin never haunt our two green covertures. | 11 | ·/˘/·/····· |
| Some organ may resound on Sunday noons | 10 | ·/˘··/·/·· |
| By where you lie, | 4 | ···· |
| Some other thrill the panes with other tunes | 10 | ·/˘····/˘· |
| Where moulder I; | 4 | ·/˘· |
| No selfsame chords compose our common lullaby. | 12 | ·/˘·˘///˘/˘· |
| The simply-cut memorial at my head | 10 | ·/˘·˘/˘··· |
| Perhaps may take | 4 | ˘/·· |
| A Gothic form, and that above your bed | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Be Greek in make; | 4 | ···· |
| No linking symbol show thereon for our tale’s sake. | 12 | ·/˘/˘·˘/·/·· |
| And in the monotonous moils of strained, hard-run | 11 | ···˘/˘····· |
| Humanity, | 4 | ˘/˘˘ |
| The eternal tie which binds us twain in one | 11 | ·˘/˘······· |
| No eye will see | 4 | ···· |
| Stretching across the miles that sever you from me. | 12 | /˘˘/···/˘··· |
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.