The Shrine ("She Watches Over the Sea") III
Stay--stay--but terror has caught us now,we passed the men in ships,we dared deeper than the fisher-folkand you strike us with terrorO bright shaft.
Flame passes under usand sparks that unknot the flesh,sorrow, splitting bone from bone,splendour athwart our eyesand rifts in the splendour,sparks and scattered light.
Many warned of this,men said:there are wrecks on the fore-beach,wind will beat your ship,there is no shelter in that headland,it is useless waste, that edge,that front of rock--sea-gulls clang beyond the breakers,none venture to that spot.
Words in this poem
- unknot v. t.
- To free from knots; to untie. [1st un- + knot.]
- splendour n.
- Great brightness; brilliant luster; brilliancy; as, the splendor ot the sun. B. Jonson. [L. fr. splendere to shine: cf. F. splendeur.]
- clang v. t.
- To strike together so as to produce a ringing metallic sound. [L. clangere; akin to Gr. clank.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Shrine ("She Watches Over the Sea") III is in the public domain. This text is taken from Sea Garden, Project Gutenberg ebook #28665; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: H.D., The Shrine ("She Watches Over the Sea") III, in Sea Garden (1916), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #28665, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/hd-sea-garden/the-shrine-she-watches-over-the-sea-iii.html, id L08252.
Form and metre
The Shrine ("She Watches Over the Sea") III is 21 lines in 3 verse paragraphs. It is unrhymed, as far as the pronouncing dictionary can tell. The metre is trochaic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.0 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 19% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in trochaic 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.
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 trochaic trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Stay--stay-- | 2 | ·· |
| but terror has caught us now, | 7 | ·/˘···· |
| we passed the men in ships, | 6 | ······ |
| we dared deeper than the fisher-folk | 9 | ··/˘··/˘· |
| and you strike us with terror | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| O bright shaft. | 3 | ··· |
| Flame passes under us | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| and sparks that unknot the flesh, | 7 | ···˘/·· |
| sorrow, splitting bone from bone, | 7 | /˘/˘··· |
| splendour athwart our eyes | 7 | /˘˘//˘· |
| and rifts in the splendour, | 6 | ····/˘ |
| sparks and scattered light. | 5 | ··/˘· |
| Many warned of this, | 5 | /˘··· |
| men said: | 2 | ·· |
| there are wrecks on the fore-beach, | 7 | ······· |
| wind will beat your ship, | 5 | ····· |
| there is no shelter in that headland, | 9 | ···/˘··/˘ |
| it is useless waste, that edge, | 7 | ··/˘··· |
| that front of rock-- | 4 | ···· |
| sea-gulls clang beyond the breakers, | 8 | ······/˘ |
| none venture to that spot. | 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.