440. Upon Rook. Epig
Rook he sells feathers, yet he still doth cryFie on this pride, this female vanity.Thus, though the Rook does rail against the sin,He loves the gain that vanity brings in.
Words in this poem
- rook n.
- Mist; fog. See Roke.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
440. Upon Rook. Epig 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, 440. Upon Rook. Epig, in Hesperides (1648), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #22421, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/herrick-hesperides/440-upon-rook-epig.html, id L06358.
Form and metre
440. Upon Rook. Epig is 4 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets, 50% of the lines. The lines average 10.0 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending.
See other poems in rhyming couplets.
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 cry · vanity · sinA · inA
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. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Rook he sells feathers, yet he still doth cry | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| Fie on this pride, this female vanity. | 10 | ·····/·/˘˘ |
| Thus, though the Rook does rail against the sin, | 10 | ·········· |
| He loves the gain that vanity brings in. | 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.