170. On Himself
I fear no earthly powers,But care for crowns of flowers;And love to have my beardWith wine and oil besmear'd.This day I'll drown all sorrow:Who knows to live to-morrow?
About this text
170. On Himself 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, 170. On Himself, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/170-on-himself.html, id L05222.
Form and metre
170. On Himself is 6 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 98%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.7 syllables. 4 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
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 AABBCC powersA · flowersA · beardB · besmear'dB · sorrowC · morrowC
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 |
|---|---|---|
| I fear no earthly powers, | 7 | ···/˘/˘ |
| But care for crowns of flowers; | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| And love to have my beard | 6 | ······ |
| With wine and oil besmear'd. | 6 | ······ |
| This day I'll drown all sorrow: | 7 | ·····/˘ |
| Who knows to live to-morrow? | 7 | ·····/˘ |
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.