Love blows as the wind blows
Love blows as the wind blows,Love blows into the heart.—NILE BOAT-SONG.
LIFE in her creaking shoesGoes, and more formal grows,A round of calls and cues:Love blows as the wind blows.Blows! . . . in the quiet closeAs in the roaring mart,By ways no mortal knowsLove blows into the heart.
The stars some cadence use,Forthright the river flows,In order fall the dews,Love blows as the wind blows:Blows! . . . and what reckoning showsThe courses of his chart?A spirit that comes and goes,Love blows into the heart.
Words in this poem
- mart v. t.
- To buy or sell in, or as in, a mart.
- forthright adv.
- Straight forward; in a straight direction. Sir P. [Forth, adv. + right, adv.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Love blows as the wind blows is in the public domain. This text is taken from Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #1568; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: W. E. Henley, Love blows as the wind blows, in Poems (1898), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1568, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/henley-poems/love-blows-as-the-wind-blows.html, id L12417.
Form and metre
Love blows as the wind blows is 18 lines in 3 stanzas. The rhyme scheme is ABABBCBC, complete in 2 of its 3 stanzas. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 86%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.3 syllables. 22% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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.
- 2 ABABBCBC shoesA · growsB · cuesA · blowsB · closeB · martC · knowsB · heartC
- 3 ABABBCBC useA · flowsB · dewsA · blowsB · showsB · chartC · goesB · heartC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Love blows as the wind blows, | 6 | ······ |
| Love blows into the heart.—NILE BOAT-SONG. | 9 | ········· |
| LIFE in her creaking shoes | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Goes, and more formal grows, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| A round of calls and cues: | 6 | ······ |
| Love blows as the wind blows. | 6 | ······ |
| Blows! . . . in the quiet close | 6 | ···/˘· |
| As in the roaring mart, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| By ways no mortal knows | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Love blows into the heart. | 6 | ······ |
| The stars some cadence use, | 6 | ···/˘· |
| Forthright the river flows, | 6 | //·/˘· |
| In order fall the dews, | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| Love blows as the wind blows: | 6 | ······ |
| Blows! . . . and what reckoning shows | 6 | ···/˘· |
| The courses of his chart? | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| A spirit that comes and goes, | 6 | ·/···· |
| Love blows into the heart. | 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.