Homeward Bound LXI
Long through my racked and weary brainDid endless thoughts and dreams revolve;But now thy lovely eyes, my dear,Have brought me to a firm resolve.
Within their radiance wise and kind,Where'er thine eyes shine, I remain.I could not have believed it trueThat I should ever love again.
About this text
Homeward Bound LXI is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems and Ballads, Project Gutenberg ebook #31726, the Emma Lazarus 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: Heinrich Heine, Homeward Bound LXI, in Poems and Ballads (1881), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #31726, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/heine-poems-ballads/homeward-bound-lxi.html, id L15386.
Form and metre
Homeward Bound LXI is 8 lines in 2 stanzas of 4 lines each. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 89%). 98% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.1 syllables. 25% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 -A-A brain · revolveA · dear · resolveA
- 2 -A-A kind · remainA · true · againA
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Long through my racked and weary brain | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| Did endless thoughts and dreams revolve; | 8 | ·/˘···˘/ |
| But now thy lovely eyes, my dear, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Have brought me to a firm resolve. | 8 | ······˘/ |
| Within their radiance wise and kind, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Where'er thine eyes shine, I remain. | 9 | ˘˘/····˘/ |
| I could not have believed it true | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| That I should ever love again. | 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.