40. The Dream
Methought last night Love in an anger cameAnd brought a rod, so whipt me with the same;Myrtle the twigs were, merely to implyLove strikes, but 'tis with gentle cruelty.Patient I was: Love pitiful grew thenAnd strok'd the stripes, and I was whole again.Thus, like a bee, Love gentle still doth bringHoney to salve where he before did sting.
Words in this poem
- imply v. t.
- To infold or involve; to wrap up. [From the same source as employ. See Employ, Ply, and cf. Implicate, Apply.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
40. The Dream 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, 40. The Dream, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/40-the-dream.html, id L05103.
Form and metre
40. The Dream is 8 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 75% of the lines: heroic couplets. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 84%). 91% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.9 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 50% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in heroic couplets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
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 AA--BBCC cameA · sameA · imply · cruelty · thenB · againB · bringC · stingC
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 pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Methought last night Love in an anger came | 10 | ˘/·····/˘· |
| And brought a rod, so whipt me with the same; | 10 | ·········· |
| Myrtle the twigs were, merely to imply | 10 | /˘···/˘·˘/ |
| Love strikes, but 'tis with gentle cruelty. | 9 | ·····/˘/˘ |
| Patient I was: Love pitiful grew then | 10 | /˘···/˘˘·· |
| And strok'd the stripes, and I was whole again. | 10 | ········˘/ |
| Thus, like a bee, Love gentle still doth bring | 10 | ·····/˘··· |
| Honey to salve where he before did sting. | 10 | /˘········ |
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.