Why Ye Blossome Cometh Before Ye Leafe
Once hoary Winter chanced--alas!Alas! hys waye mistaking,A leafless apple tree to passWhere Spring lay dreaming. “Fie ye lass!Ye lass had best be waking,”Quoth he, and shook hys robe, and lo!Lo! forth didde flye a cloud of snowe.
Now in ye bough an elfe there dwelte,An elfe of wondrous powere,That when ye chillye snowe didde pelte,With magic charm each flake didde melte,Didde melte into a flowere;And Spring didde wake and marvelle how,How blossomed so ye leafless bough.
The Infant Earth one April day(The first of April--so they say),When toddling on her usual round,Spied in her path upon the groundA dainty little garland ringOf violets--and that was Spring.She caught the pretty wreath of SpringAnd all the birds began to sing,But when she thought to hold it tight’T was rudely jerked from out her sight;And while she looked for it in vainThe birds all flew away again.
Alas! The flowering wreath of SpringWas fastened to a silken string,And Time, the urchin, laughed for glee(He held the other end you see).
And that was long ago, they say,When Time was young and Earth was gay.Now Earth is old and Time is lame,Yet still they play the same old game:Old Earth still reaches out for Spring,And Time--well--Time still holds the string.
Words in this poem
- hoary a.
- White or whitish."The hoary willows."
- mistaking n.
- An error; a mistake.
- lass n.
- A youth woman; a girl; a sweetheart. [OE. lasse; prob. of Celtic origin; cf. W. llodes girl, fem. of llawd lad. (Lad a youth.]
- quoth v. t.
- Said; spoke; uttered; -- used only in the first and third persons in the past tenses, and always followed by its nominative, the word or words said being the object; as, quoth I. quoth he. [AS.cweedhan, imp cwæedh, pl. cwædon; akin to OS. queedhan, OHG. quethan, quedan, Icel. kveedha, Goth. qiþan. sq. root22. Cf. Bequeath.]
- shook v. t.
- To pack, as staves, in a shook.
- wondrous adv.
- In a wonderful or surprising manner or degree; wonderfully. [OE. wonders, adv. (later also adj.). See Wonder, n., and cf. -wards.]
- flake n.
- A paling; a hurdle. [prov. Eng.] [Cf. Icel. flaki, fleki, Dan. flage, D. vlaak.]
- marvelle v. t.
- To marvel at. Wyclif.
- dainty n.
- Value; estimation; the gratification or pleasure taken in anything. [OE. deinie, dainte, deintie, deyntee, OF. deintié delicacy, orig., dignity, honor, fr. L. dignitas, fr. dignus worthy. See Deign, and cf. Dignity.]
- glee n.
- Music; minstrelsy; entertainment.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Why Ye Blossome Cometh Before Ye Leafe is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Bashful Earthquake, & Other Fables and Verses, Project Gutenberg ebook #56765; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Oliver Herford, Why Ye Blossome Cometh Before Ye Leafe, in The Bashful Earthquake, and Other Fables and Verses (1898), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #56765, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herford-bashful-earthquake/why-ye-blossome-cometh-before-ye-leafe.html, id L22101.
Form and metre
Why Ye Blossome Cometh Before Ye Leafe is 36 lines in 5 verse paragraphs. It is in rhyming couplets, 72% of the lines: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 92%).
See other poems in octosyllabic couplets, 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 ABAABCC alasA · mistakingB · passA · lassA · wakingB · loC · snoweC
- 2 ABAABCC dwelteA · powereB · pelteA · melteA · flowereB · howC · boughC
- 3 AABBCCCCDDEE dayA · sayA · roundB · groundB · ringC · springC · springC · singC · tightD · sightD · vainE · againE
- 4 AABB springA · stringA · gleeB · seeB
- 5 AABBCC sayA · gayA · lameB · gameB · springC · stringC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Once hoary Winter chanced--alas! | 8 | ·/˘/˘·˘/ |
| Alas! hys waye mistaking, | 7 | ˘/··˘/˘ |
| A leafless apple tree to pass | 8 | ·/˘/˘··· |
| Where Spring lay dreaming. “Fie ye lass! | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| Ye lass had best be waking,” | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Quoth he, and shook hys robe, and lo! | 8 | ········ |
| Lo! forth didde flye a cloud of snowe. | 8 | ········ |
| Now in ye bough an elfe there dwelte, | 8 | ········ |
| An elfe of wondrous powere, | 7 | ···/˘·· |
| That when ye chillye snowe didde pelte, | 8 | ········ |
| With magic charm each flake didde melte, | 8 | ·/˘····· |
| Didde melte into a flowere; | 7 | ······· |
| And Spring didde wake and marvelle how, | 8 | ·····˘/· |
| How blossomed so ye leafless bough. | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| The Infant Earth one April day | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| (The first of April--so they say), | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| When toddling on her usual round, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| Spied in her path upon the ground | 8 | ········ |
| A dainty little garland ring | 8 | ·/˘/˘/˘· |
| Of violets--and that was Spring. | 8 | ·/˘˘···· |
| She caught the pretty wreath of Spring | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And all the birds began to sing, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| But when she thought to hold it tight | 8 | ········ |
| ’T was rudely jerked from out her sight; | 9 | ··/˘····· |
| And while she looked for it in vain | 8 | ········ |
| The birds all flew away again. | 8 | ····˘/˘/ |
| Alas! The flowering wreath of Spring | 8 | ˘/·/˘··· |
| Was fastened to a silken string, | 8 | ·/˘··/˘· |
| And Time, the urchin, laughed for glee | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| (He held the other end you see). | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And that was long ago, they say, | 8 | ····˘/·· |
| When Time was young and Earth was gay. | 8 | ········ |
| Now Earth is old and Time is lame, | 8 | ········ |
| Yet still they play the same old game: | 8 | ········ |
| Old Earth still reaches out for Spring, | 8 | ···/˘··· |
| And Time--well--Time still holds the string. | 8 | ········ |
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