1020. A Sonnet of Perilla
Then did I live when I did seePerilla smile on none but me.But, ah! by stars malignant crossed,The life I got I quickly lost;But yet a way there doth remainFor me embalm'd to live again,And that's to love me; in which stateI'll live as one regenerate.
Words in this poem
- perilla n.
- A genus of labiate herbs, of which one species (Perilla ocimoides, or P. Nankinensis) is often cultivated for its purple or variegated foliage. [Etymol. uncertain.]
- regenerate v. t.
- To generate or produce anew; to reproduce; to give new life, strength, or vigor to.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
1020. A Sonnet of Perilla is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2, Project Gutenberg ebook #22421; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Robert Herrick, 1020. A Sonnet of Perilla, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/1020-a-sonnet-of-perilla.html, id L05922.
Form and metre
1020. A Sonnet of Perilla is 8 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets: octosyllabic couplets. The metre is iambic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 96%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 8.1 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 38% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
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 AABBCCDD seeA · meA · crossedB · lostB · remainC · againC · stateD · regenerateD
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Then did I live when I did see | 8 | ········ |
| Perilla smile on none but me. | 8 | ˘/˘····· |
| But, ah! by stars malignant crossed, | 9 | ····˘/˘·˘ |
| The life I got I quickly lost; | 8 | ·····/˘· |
| But yet a way there doth remain | 8 | ······˘/ |
| For me embalm'd to live again, | 8 | ··˘/··˘/ |
| And that's to love me; in which state | 8 | ········ |
| I'll live as one regenerate. | 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.